Education

“The Door” Opens to Low-income Teen Workers

By Mohammed Diallo
Spectrum staff

Marcus Bruno, 17, is part of a household of four that struggles financially.

“You know my family isn’t in the best position right now and I want to start helping out … and I have a younger sibling in my family that I can take care of,” Bruno said.

That’s why he needs to have his own job. In five weeks, Bruno starts a job at The Gap’s 34^th Street store, folding clothes and doing other customer service work. His job comes courtesy of The Door, a nonprofit agency launched in 1972. For 13- to 24-years-old, it runs a health clinic and offers services ranging from behavioral and mental health counseling to academic tutoring to college-prep courses.

For his part, Bruno is glad The Door helped him get a job and, before that, gave him access to coaches who taught him how to create a cover letter and resume. Agency staffers gave him a suit—purchased at trendy H&M—to wear on job interviews.

“The Door understands that there are a lot of young people on the street who are not doing nothing and not in school, who doesn’t have food, who doesn’t have family that can support everyday activities for them,” said Samantha Jean Charles, 24, a social worker at the agency.

The Door’s summer jobs program—which operates during a period of especially high teen unemployment—is run through its This Way Ahead project. The project partners with three major department stores, Gap, Banana Republic and Old Navy.

“Employers should stop thinking about what we already know but start thinking about what we can learn,” said Henny de LaCruz, 16, who will be working at Old Navy on 125th Street. “We can learn a lot, and the workplace also teaches us to interact with other people, which is a necessary skill for the future.”

The money she earns will go into the college savings account she opened during 9th grade.