The City of Meridian is looking to hire Meridian High School seniors. Mayor Percy Bland stopped by the school yesterday, encouraging students to apply.
“They can work in any of our departments. They’re mentored by someone in that department,” said Bland.
The job opportunity is a part of the Graduate Advancement Program, also known as GAP.
The purpose of the program is to expose students to a work environment that will help them develop life skills through employment.
“They’ll learn a lot of soft skills from how to dress, how to communicate, how to be at work on time, and a lot of skills needed to be productive in a work environment,” said Bland.
“I work in the human resources department, but sometimes I’m with the mayor. You shred papers, you go in and report every day at two,” said Trequan Houston.
Students in the program also attend workshops and go on field trips.
“They teach students basic employment ready-skills, including reading comprehension, financial comprehension, and basically get students ready to go into the workforce,” said Christinia Coon.
“We went to the Mississippi bread company during spring break and Eden, where you go to a space program where they show you all the parts to spaceships,” said Derik Griffin.
Nine seniors currently work for the city, and the city hopes to hire at least seven more.
“When we reach capacity in this program, we want to do another program just in case we have some that weren’t able to get into this program,” said Bland.
GAP is being funded by the U.S. Department of labor.
.png)