The Opportunity Center

What if there were one place that families and youth could go to that would meet all of their needs? A place where organizations could stop duplicating efforts and create positive change in their community? In 2024, we will answer that question when two Opportunity Centers opens its doors in Gulfport and Biloxi to the youth of the Gulf Coast. The Opportunity Center is a national model for the power and possibility of collaboration in community service.

Preparing Youth for the Future

As we chart the future of BGC, we are committed to enhancing programs and our facilities, allowing us to serve more kids, more often, with greater impact. This will ensure a thriving economy for the future.

By coming together under one roof, our goals are simple:

Align existing youth initiatives, resources and expertise to meet the needs of young people on the Gulf Coast;
Ensure all young people can easily access basic needs: caring adults, a warm bed, hot meals, a safe environment, good health care, an effective education and opportunities to help others;
Seek to expand the services facing the greatest demand and remove barriers that prevent youth from receiving help; and
Increase operating efficiency through shared back-office services.

The Need for Workforce Development

About 50.5 million people quit their jobs in 2022, beating out the 47.8 million in 2021, according to Job Openings and Labor Turnover Survey data. This is often referred to as the “Great Resignation.” A Cengage group survey report, dubbed the subsequent surge in upskilling as the "Great Retraining" to follow the "Great Resignation.”

In Mississippi, nearly 20 percent of youth ages 16 to 24 are out of school and not working, the highest rate in the nation. Additionally, 75% of teens lack confidence in their knowledge of personal finance and 73% of teens reported wanting more personal finance education in 2021. In a McKinsey survey, 40% of employers said lack of skills was the main reason for entry-level job vacancies. 60% said that new graduates were not adequately prepared for the world of work.

Additionally, there were gaps in technical skills such as STEM subject degrees but also in soft skills such as communication, teamwork, and punctuality. The Mississippi Governor’s Education Human Capital Task Force report cited that Mississippi has a shortage of teachers in STEM subjects, creating an even larger gap for Mississippi youth on a national scale. Currently, there is an increasing “skills gap”; many young people today do not have the skills or work ethic required for jobs that pay a middle-class wage. A Harvard Graduate School of Education survey of several hundred employers concluded that young people are inadequately prepared for the workplace, especially high school graduates – whom they perceive as “deficient” in basic communication skills, critical thinking, and professionalism.

CLICK HERE TO LEARN ABOUT OUR WORKFORCE DEVELOPMENT APPROACH

Our Partners

Goodwill Industries is the key partner for the Youth Opportunity Centers, assisting with turning the areas into training centers to empower individuals and strengthen families. Services within the center include occupational skills training, career centers that assist with job searches, writing résumés and building interview skills, job readiness/soft skills/work adjustment, on-the-job training, supported employment, and E-learning. Goodwill’s partnership includes providing a staff member to staff the program and programs listed below.

NorthStar Digital Literacy
NorthStar Digital Literacy is a service that provides the basic skills needed to perform tasks on the computer and online for potential job seekers looking to find, obtain, and retain employment. This program includes learning modules in three main areas:
- Essential computer skills - basic computer skills, internet basics, using
- Email, Windows OS, Mac OS
- Essential software skills – Microsoft word, excel, PowerPoint, Google Docs
- Using technology in daily life - social media, information literacy, career search skills, accessing telehealth, supporting K-12 distance learning, managing your digital footprint.
Once the account has been established, users can take assessments onsite or from anywhere through NorthStar’s online proctoring component. Users that successfully pass an assessment will receive the NorthStar Digital Literacy Certificate. Users can include these certifications on resumes to demonstrate that they have mastered the required basic computer skills needed for job placement.
My Career Advisor
An online career development and training resource that can be accessed from anywhere that provides the following services:

Community resources – can provide referrals for additional services in the community in the following areas:
- Education & training services
- Family & community
- Financial & legal
- Food, housing, or transportation
- Health & well-being
- Resumes and cover letter development
- Interview skills and interactive practice
- Career exploration in different industries,
- Job listings
- Access to local job fairs and hiring events
Skills to Succeed Academy
Skills to Succeed Academy is a complimentary online certificate training program focusing on building the skills needed for career exploration, job placement, and career advancement. The platform consists of components including:
- Online pre-assessment that generates a personalized learning curriculum based on the user’s needs
- Thirty-six interactive modules that cover: Choosing your career, Obtaining employment, How to succeed in your career, and Steps for career advancement.
- Simulations that allow you to try out real-life work scenarios (job interview, first day on the job, etc.)
- Certificates are issued for each module and/or course that the user completes
My Next Move

My Next Move is an interactive tool for job seekers and students to learn more about their career options. My Next Move has tasks, skills, salary information, and more for over 900 different careers. Users can find careers through keyword searches, browsing industries that employ different types of workers, or the O*NET Interest Profiler. This tool offers personalized career suggestions based on a person's interests and level of work experience.

The American Heart Association is equipping the site with a micro-pantry to serve food-insecure families with healthy food. Mississippi has the worst hunger problem in America. Almost 1 in 4 Mississippians — about 600,840 people — don't have enough to eat. More than 1 in 4 children (24.4%) go to bed hungry most nights. The micro-pantry will provide access to nutritious AHA-approved foods.

Mississippi State Extension Resource & Referral Room (R&R Room) provides training and support for teachers on topics such as classroom design and instruction, developing fine motor skills and other early education matters. They will provide families with books and learning materials on child and youth development as well as training on a variety of parenting topics.

Mississippi Center for Autism will provide tools and resources for families with children on the autism spectrum such as screenings, individualized programs and curriculum, data-based decision making, positive reinforcement, and generalization.

Hancock Whitney will provide classes for parents and youth with topics like money identification, needs and wants, goal setting, saving strategies, credit cards, and debt. The courses empower parent and families with information about how to make tough financial decisions about credit cards, financing higher education, and other important money matters.

Open Doors Homeless Coalition will have space in the building to focus on combating teen and youth homelessness across the Mississippi Gulf Coast.

El Pueblo will assist in English translation services for English as a Second Language (ESL) learners. In Harrison County, the non-English language spoken by the largest group is Spanish, which is spoken by nearly 10,000 people in the community.

Canopy Children’s Solutions, Pine Belt Mental Health, Rivers Psychotherapy will have office space as well as shared use space to assist youth and families experiencing mental health hardships through individualized and group services.

Locations

Here on the Mississippi Coast, the Boys & Girl Clubs impacts thousands of young people each year through the six Club sites in Harrison and Hancock County. Accessibility of services is essential to our program’s effectiveness. Young people must be reached in their communities and within their own neighborhoods. Both Opportunity Centers are centrally located within the communities that need it the most.