SOAR 55 Expands Efforts to Assist Unemployed

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SOAR 55 has just received a grant of $46,000 from Tufts Health Plan Foundation to help unemployed and underemployed older workers. Traditionally, SOAR 55 provides opportunities for employed and retired professionals to offer their expertise to nonprofits as volunteers. But, in today’s economy many people who are retired want or need to get back in the workforce.

Through the funding from Tufts, SOAR 55 is working to attract retired, unemployed or underemployed people to volunteer positions. The sudden rise in unemployment rates among older workers presents an opportunity for SOAR 55 to expand its recruitment efforts and effectively meet the growing needs of nonprofits, many of which are struggling with reduced budgets.

The benefits include:

• Maintaining existing skills
• Learning new skills
• Networking
• Giving back to the community

Margot Lansing is a longtime volunteer with SOAR 55. Despite holding a PhD, she recently found herself underemployed as a result of the downturn in the economy. “Having trained as a SOAR 55 management consultant, in addition to my professional experience, I am better positioned to use my analytical, organizational and communication skills in a positive way to help nonprofit organizations. For those of us who are underemployed or unemployed, SOAR 55 is a natural community where we derive support and friendship through giving back to the community,” she said.

SOAR 55 is working in collaboration with the Massachusetts Department of Workforce Development and its Employment and Training Resources division. SOAR Volunteers are speaking at workshops to encourage older people to volunteer their skills while they look for a job. At a recent session in Wellesley, SOAR 55 volunteers recounted how volunteer assignments led them to develop new career paths and even a new business.

One volunteer is pursuing a career in massage therapy after volunteering to do hand massages at Dana Farber. Another volunteer who is serving in a Framingham elementary school is considering pursuing teaching credentials. Yet another volunteer, after tutoring a boy in preparation for his Bar Mitzvah, has developed a new business to help other Jewish adolescents prepare for the momentous ceremony and even invented a device that speaks the related words and songs from the Torah.

In addition to SOAR 55, Newton Community Service Center provides family services that enable infants through teens to become thriving adults. We do so through early literacy, child-abuse prevention, early education and childcare, counseling services, teen programs and drop-in centers, parenting support and education, after-school and camp programs and more.