Kites were flying high at Project SOAR’s 25th Anniversary Celebration.
Kites were soaring over Bayfront Festival Park on September 21, 2005 as Project SOAR hosted a celebration marking 25 years of service to the Northland. Staff and Board Members dished up root beer floats and handed out free popcorn and kites while current and former clients visited with each other, former staff members, and community supporters. Funders and representatives of other local organizations were present to offer their congratulations and share in the festivities.
Project SOAR is a Duluth based non-profit organization that provides career planning and business planning services. The mission of Project SOAR is helping people identify, obtain, and keep their ideal job and advocating for improved employment opportunities in the Northland. In the past year, over 300 participants enrolled in programs to help them accomplish their employment or self-employment goals.
Mayor Herb Bergson was on hand with a proclamation of support for Project SOAR and the estimated 7000 people who have been helped through the years to gain employment, enroll in schooling, or start a business. “Try to imagine, if you will, the impact of this work.” Mayor Bergson reflected, “Even if just one person had been helped, and we know it has been so many more than that, … think of what it means! Someone who had been unemployed was able to support a family, buy a house perhaps, contribute and know the satisfaction of good work through the years.”
Project SOAR founders caught up on old times. Left to right Connie Dinan, Project SOAR’s first Career Developer, Pat Gosz, Project SOAR’s first Executive Director, and Joyce Benson, a Project SOAR founding Board Member.
Several founding members of the organization came to recognize the 25th Anniversary. The first director of Project SOAR, Pat Gosz, marveled at the development of the organization over the years and noted her satisfaction about having been a part of founding the non-profit organization back in 1980. Project SOAR was founded after the State of Minnesota passed legislation to provide assistance to displaced homemakers, people who due to divorce, abandonment, or the disablement or death of their spouse suddenly needed to enter the workforce, often with few or outdated job skills. While the organization does still serve displaced homemakers, the makeup of the clientele ranges from those with advanced degrees and good work histories to those with multiple barriers and limited or poor work histories. Both in-depth, long-term services needed by some to break the cycle of poverty and also short-term services like preparation of resumes and cover letters, interview coaching, and interest/career assessments are offered. The staff focuses on the whole person and on the whole employment process, highlighting the strengths inherent in each person and uses those strengths to assist each person to realize their potential.
Over the past 10 years, Project SOAR has been offering business planning workshops called WISE, Women’s Initiative for Self-Employment. It is the only entrepreneurial program in Northeast Minnesota specifically designed for women. The12-week (36 hours) interactive workshop covers all aspects of business planning. A combination of classroom work, guest presenters from the community, one-on-one technical assistance, and follow-up with the Program Coordinator helps women decide the feasibility of starting a business. The format is highly supportive and personalized, and it includes tutorial sessions where clients can work together or with a staff person on difficult portions of the planning process.
Staff and Board Members serve root beer floats and popcorn. Left to right, Career Developer Greg Mielke; Board Members: Deb Topping, Steve Wagner and Sue Bradford.
Project SOAR estimates that between 50 and 100 businesses have started due to the WISE program. Many of those businesses had set up displays of their goods and services at the event and had contributed prizes such as gift certificates to a greenhouse and gift shop, massage therapy, leather repair, and an English Tea for Two. Free 15-minute chair massages were a popular offering at the event.
Executive Director, Rebecca Ellenson comments, “Project SOAR provides a vital service that is NOT found anywhere else in our community. Our career planning services are just that, CAREER planning. We help each individual overcome their barriers, identify their strengths and dreams, and develop a sustainable career path given their particular skills, knowledge, interests, experience, and abilities. We offer proven long term services and a personalized, wholistic approach. What we see is nothing short of transformed lives! Clients often come to us discouraged and without hope. Unemployment is hard in so many ways. But they exit our programs with a plan for personal and economic success and the confidence to pursue that plan."
Our services include the “soft skills” training that employers say is missing when they hire people: the work ethic combination of attitude, motivation, presentation, and enthusiasm that differentiates the strong, promotable employee from the mediocre employee.
Soar Career Solutions · 205 West 2nd Street · Suite 101 · Duluth, MN 55802
Phone: (218) 722-3126 · Fax: (218) 722-4617 · Email: info@soarcareers.org
This website was made possible through a grant from the Duluth/Superior Area Community Foundation.
We are grateful for their support!