Lanie Kary welds on the hulls of fishing boats for J&H Boatworks Inc.; Rebecca Kraft creates a census of businesses for the Astoria Downtown Historic District Association; and Kimberly Lebeck organizes the offices of the Northwest Oregon Housing Authority.

And all along, a federally funded career center, and two career coaches, help them and more than 200 other students at Clatsop Community College graduate and find employment afterward.

Whether you do it with a career coach or other intrusive advising when students feel they belong and feel theyre supported, their likelihood of completing the degree program or completing the certificate program just skyrockets, said Elizabeth Hayes, a career guidance counselor who started at Clatsop this year after the college received nearly $1 million in federal grants from the U.S. Department of Labor.

I believe someone in the workplace can provide valuable guidance for people who are heading toward jobs.

CCC, in unison with a consortium of the other 16 community colleges in Oregon, pursued a joint, $18 million Credentials, Acceleration, and Support for Employment (CASE) grant from the U.S. Department of Labor. Clatsop received $936,668 of that to fund two career coaches, Elizabeth Hayes and David Ramsey, and a career center opened in the summer of 2012. The grant, which runs through September, is designed to support students from enrollment to graduation and then to employment.

A CASE for employment

The aim of the grant is to help people find their way into family-sustaining wages as quickly as possible, said Hayes, estimating that the career center provides a support structure for more than 200 students.

As part of the CASE grant, Ramsey and Hayes work with students at the career center in Towler Hall, which provides career exploration tools, workplace readiness and application and interview preparation. They go to the classroom for lectures, assemble business panels and professionals to share on relevant topics and incorporate classes by the Clatsop Economic Development Resources and the Small Business Development Center.

Its always more powerful when it comes from an employer, said Hayes, a former private sector human resources professional who, along with Ramsey, recently took Tommie Redwines human resources class on a tour of Englund Marine and Industrial Supply, where they ended by asking owner Kurt Englund and Vice President Theresa Turner how they hire and manage their employees.

Hayes and Ramsey are trying to make the field trips a regular occurrence as another way to connect students with what employers want.

I think it makes me more likely to complete, knowing I have the support if I need it, said Lebeck, whos studying for her associates degree in business management. Lebeck takes Redwines class, works with the career center and has a part-time internship at NOHA.

On the job

Lebeck is one of 26 students working throughout the community as part of cooperative work experience, a requirement for most majors besides general studies and those that transfer to a university.

Students gather a total of at least 66 hours worth of work experience, most of it volunteerism that Hayes said students must treat as a job. They also take a one-credit seminar on entering the workforce.

It just depends on where theyre headed with their goal, said Lisa Nyberg, a career counselor and director of cooperative education who combs the community searching for businesses to take on student interns. Some are cold calls. Some I go visit. I sell it to the employer and the student. It works for the employer and the student. We cover the liability while the student is at the work site.

Kary started welding at J&H Boatworks a couple weeks ago. She hopes to one day work as a pipe fitter or boat welder professionally, adding that the references from her work experience and welding instructor Jesse Fulton will make the difference.

I have good references from this and Jesse, said Kary, who also provides welding projects around campus. If you can get a good reference, you can get a good job.

Her employer, J&H Manager Kevin Eaton, said welding steel stabilizers and a keel cooler to the bottom of a boat is the perfect, easy project to help a beginning student welder. Next term, Kary will work at Columbia Steel Supply, the sales front of J&H.

A lot of our employees come from the college, said Eaton. Its a good pool to draw from.

Students currently work at anywhere from Columbia Memorial Hospital, Knappa High School and the Riversea Gallery to Petco, Seaside Fire & Rescue and the Port of Astoria. At the downtown association, Kraft is performing a census of the downtown business community.

Id like to own a business downtown, said Kraft. I want to have a wine bar.

She helps Garner gather the information on businesses that will further improve the downtown association and help the mostly volunteer group win coveted grant dollars. Meanwhile, shes introduced to her prospective neighbors.

With the work study program, its something we can start populating immediately, said Garner, the only paid employee of the downtown association. Its just a big picture of what our downtown looks like.

Theres a lot going on, so to partner with the college is a win-win.

Garner and Kraft do weekly interviews, midterm meeting and a final review. Student interns also review the internship.

Uncertain future

Were pretty confident that most of our folks are going to be graduating and obtaining their certificates within the time frame, said Hayes, adding her uncertainty about whether the CASE grant will be extended beyond the beginning of next year. She said that she and Ramsey are working to make the programs they set up self-sustaining.

And funding remains one of the biggest hindrances, said Nyberg and Institutional Researcher Tom Gill, to tracking students more after they graduate. More than half of the students at Clatsop are declared for a career-technical certificate or degree, rather than a transfer degree for further schooling.

According to the last graduate survey, conducted on the class of 2011-12 with about 24 percent of students responding, 63 percent reported being employed shortly after graduation. Of those, 60 percent or more percent worked in their areas of study, earning an average hourly salary of nearly $18 and working near or at full time.

And the highest levels of government are taking note of the role of community colleges.

Ive asked Vice President (Joe) Biden to lead an across-the-board reform of Americas training programs to make sure they have one mission: train Americans with the skills employers need, and match them to good jobs that need to be filled right now, said President Barack Obama in his State of the Union Address Tuesday night.

That means more on-the-job training, and more apprenticeships that set a young worker on an upward trajectory for life. It means connecting companies to community colleges that can help design training to fill their specific needs.

The colleges career center is in Towler 312 on the main campus. Its open to all students and for employers wanting to advertise jobs at the college. For more information on the career center, or if a business willing to take part in panels or college tours or employer panels, contact Elizabeth Hayes at 503-338-2433 or ehayes@clatsopcc.edu. Employers interested in offering internships can contact Lisa Nyberg at 503-338-2480 or lnyberg@clatsopcc.edu