Job fair targets female inmates

    University of Maine at Presque Isle Criminal Justice students are organizing a Job Fair for the Women’s Transition Center in Bangor, and they’re looking for Bangor-area employers to participate.     The job fair, scheduled for Thursday, June 26, from 10 a.m. to noon at the transition center, is meant to help female offenders – who are finishing prison sentences and preparing to re-enter society – to connect with potential employers. Local colleges will provide resume and interviewing workshops during the event and Congressman Michael Michaud is scheduled to attend.
    “The purpose of the job fair is twofold – to help these women make contacts with local businesses and help demystify them in the eyes of local employers,” said Dr. Lisa Leduc, the criminal justice professor who is overseeing this project. “This is an untapped labor resource for employers and we want them to be openminded when looking at applicants with a felony conviction.”
    The Bangor transition center is a new, secure, 40-bed facility located at the state-owned Dorothea Dix Psychiatric Center and overseen by Volunteers of America Northern New England, Inc., in partnership with the Maine Department of Corrections. The center is designed for female offenders from the Maine Correctional Center at Windham who are preparing to transition back into the community. The women at the transition center are non-violent, minimum-risk offenders in the last 18 months of their sentence. Most have GEDs and many have some college education.
    Twelve criminal justice students are participating in the service learning project, which is being completed as part of their Sociology/Criminal Justice Honors Class, Women and Crime. Students interviewed women at the center to understand the type of work they were looking for. They also researched a similar job fair that took place last summer at the Maine Correctional Center in Windham and determined that several companies had a positive experience at that event – some had even hired women who were there – and expressed a willingness to participate again.
    Throughout the project, students have been learning about the specific challenges faced by female offenders – upon re-entry, the most important tool to avoid recidivism is a job. However, these women are not often given job interviews or call-backs because they have to check off “felon” on their applications. According to Leduc, this is the students’ attempt to get employers to see past that stigma. Until the end of the semester, when they hand over the project to the transition center, students are working on one main objective – recruiting more employers.
    “It’s very important for these employers to know that they are under no obligation to hire anyone because they participate,” Leduc said. “We’re just hoping they will meet these women and learn more about them as potential employees.”
    To find out more about participating in the Job Fair, contact Leduc at 764-9436 or lisa.leduc@umpi.edu.