H&H Workers Go Back To School
The Daily Dispatch
Al Wheless, Writer
July 26, 2003
Vance-Granville Community College will play a major role in helping former Harriet & Henderson Yarns employees get back on their feet financially after being laid off July 15 at the Harriet No. 2 plant.
“We are going to make sure they know how to complete job applications, help them prepare job resumes and give them effective job interviewing skills,” said Dorothy Williams, the coordinator of the human resources development program at Vance-Granville.
“Some of them will be changing careers,” Williams said. “We will test them to find out their job interests, their aptitudes and their attitudes.”
The community college is helping the laid-off workers deal with Vance County’s painful transition from an economy based on tobacco, textiles and other low-tech manufacturing. Retraining is seen as one of the keys in confronting Vance’s state-high unemployment rate of 15.5 percent.
Williams said she and other Vance-Granville staff members will assist the new students in planning and setting goals for the future. “We will try to help them with employment and education goals.”
Her duties include working with the human resources development, occupation extension and basic skills/GED departments through a program called Pathways to Employment Training.
“In Pathways, we try to teach students job-seeking/job-keeping skills,” Williams said.
Through the basic skills/GED department, the students can work toward getting their high school equivalency degree, she added. “Through occupation extension, they can learn a skill.”
The classes through occupation extension include customer service, office assistant, advanced office assistant, nurse’s assistant and commercial cleaning.
More classes can be set up if there is a demand for them, Williams said.
The laid-off workers who have entered human resources development can take a free course on introduction to computers. Other classes in the department are also without charge.
“We do classes on rŽsumŽ writing,” Williams said.
One of the basic computer classes will begin Aug. 4 at the main campus. That also will be the location of a human resources development class that will start Aug. 18.
The college’s courses can vary in length from 12 hours to 115 hours. The human resources development classes cover tips on job hunting, employability, motivation, retention, career planning and assessment.
Soon after workers at the Harriet & Henderson’s last local plant, Harriet No. 2, found out they were losing their jobs, they were visited by Vance-Granville employees, who gave them a schedule of classes and told them about available financial aid.
Former Harriet & Henderson workers can sign up for the program they like, Williams said. Many choose human resources development because they see it as a self-enrichment program.
“It’s nonacademic,” Williams said. “They don’t have to worry about being out of school and whether they are going to pass or fail.”
The student have gone through testing, she said. They have received applications for enrollment into curriculum programs and applications for Pell grants.
“A lot of them would rather be in school than at home,” Williams said. “Some of them can’t go out of the area because of their children. They can’t drive to Durham or Raleigh because they have a family.”
A Vance-Granville program called EMERGE is located off campus by the Employment Security Commission office at the Crossroads Shopping Center. “I will be referring some of these persons up there,” Williams said. “They do seminars, job counseling and job placement. They have some financial assistance available.”
She refers people to the financial aid office at the school, the Work Force Investment Act program, the EMERGE program and the state Employment Security Commission office.
The occupation extension program has some funds available for short-term training, Williams said. “It has helped some persons.”
She has worked with the human resources development program since 1974. “I enjoy helping and working with people,” she said. “I’ve always worked with unemployed persons because it is what the human resources development program is all about.”
The writer can be reached at awheless@hendersondispatch.com .
