The downtown Ottawa business community felt street youth were a problem, harassing shoppers and committing acts of vandalism. Social service agencies thought the young people were disadvantaged in their search for services, housing, jobs and education. The street kids themselves said they wanted access to legitimate employment.

Out of these concerns was born Rideau Street Youth Enterprises (RYSE), an innovative program offering work experience, job skills training and basic education to school drop outs 16 to 22 years old.

An estimated 300 "street youth" inhabit the
city's downtown area at any given time.

Today, RYSE runs a job bank for youth to gain work experience and income, and also offers a 9 month training and placement program in Internet technology. It was established by a collaboration of the Sandy Hill Community Health Centre, local business people, politicians, social service agencies and police.

"We were experienced with street youth and could offer health and social services counselling, but we couldn't create jobs, and that's where the partnership with business came in," says Ken Hoffman, chair of the RYSE board and staff member at the Sandy Hill Community Health Centre.

An estimated 300 "street youth" inhabit the city's downtown area at any given time. Most are school drop outs who lack stable housing and job skills and have poor relationships with their families. Some have criminal records.

RYSE was launched in 1993 and since then the need to help street youth obtain job training and work has only increased, Hoffman says.

Changes to social assistance rules in the mid 1990s reduced eligibility for 16 and 17 year olds and contributed to the growth of "squeegee culture", says Hoffman. (Squeegee kids work at busy intersections, cleaning car windshields for spare change.) Prostitution has also increased among these young people, who have few job skills to support themselves, he says.

As an alternative, the RYSE job bank offers youth "a lot of chances" if they want legitimate work, says manager Jan Sistek.

Sistek says a variety of personal problems and little familiarity with the demands of regular work are some of the barriers to work that the youth face.

"There's a lot to distract them from work. I have the same expectations as a regular employer, but I don't carry as big a stick. I give them the opportunity to improve themselves and I'm more compassionate. If they're late for work the first day, I tell them it's unacceptable, but I don't fire them."

"The emphasis is how they do on the job, and
they find that quite liberating because
they're used to being treated as 'cases'."

The job bank provides employment for 20 to 24 youth -- about one third female -- in several different areas. It owns a moving van and takes on small moving jobs. It also offers landscaping services, waste audits of garbage (to gauge the success of recycling efforts), and has an odd jobs division.

The Byward Market Business Improvement Association has hired youth through the job bank for tasks such as postering. "It's a great program, one of the few social programs that actually gets kids off the streets and into work," says BIA chair Dawn Dannehl.

Sistek says the non profit job bank has low overhead costs, but faces the same risks as other businesses as well as some extra challenges. He says he's constantly training new workers -- helping them develop skills appropriate to the working world -- and losing his best ones, as they graduate to work for regular employers.

The job bank does not take a lot of information about the youth it engages, Hoffman notes. "To some extent, we don't care about their background. The emphasis is how they do on the job, and they find that quite liberating because they're used to being treated as 'cases'."

Job bank experience can be the entry point into RYSE's new Internet technology job training and work placement program.

Until 1996, when a sharp decline in prices for recycled products forced it to close, RYSE ran No Sort Recycling, a business that gave youth full-time work for nine months. Sixty-two per cent of the 39 youth who completed the nine-month term either returned to school, enlisted in a training program or obtained full-time employment. The new program, which focuses on web site development, began in the fall of 1997 and has received federal Government funding. It offers basic education and job skills enhancement for youth and, as of spring 1998, has enrolled 12 youth ranging from 18 to 22 years, says instructor Peter Wilson. There are two six week placements during nine month program.

Many of the youth in the enrolled program
have difficulty concentrating on reading.

Participants have literacy levels between grades four and nine, says Wilson."Design and visual integration is a big part of the program, and to illustrate something, you need to read it. I think of this as a sneaky way to get the kids reading more."

Many of the youth in the enrolled program have difficulty concentrating on reading, says Wilson, a teacher with extra special education training and experience with low literacy.

"The additional stimulation of sound, music and pictures (on web sites) can help keep their attention on the written word. The additional stimulation helps."

The program is designed to develop jobs skills -- and literacy. A key goal is to boost the participants' literacy levels enough to allow them to pass exams for a diploma which would give them the equivalent of high school graduation.

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