Five thousand jobs in five years. That was the aim of Opportunity Chicago in 2006 when it set out to help 5,000 public housing residents prepare for and find quality jobs by the end of 2010. As of April, 2010 almost 5,700 Chicago Housing Authority (CHA) residents have found employment, and thousands more have benefited from cutting-edge job training and placement programs and system-wide alignment of the city’s public workforce services.

Opportunity Chicago is a collaborative of government agencies, foundations, nonprofit organizations and employers. This $27.5 million initiative was developed jointly by the CHA, the City of Chicago and The Partnership for New Communities, a group of business, civic and foundation partners that supports the people and places most affected by CHA’s 15-year Plan for Transformation (The Plan).

Driven by The Plan, an unprecedented endeavor to transform public housing, Opportunity Chicago is a comprehensive effort to connect low-skilled public housing residents to employment and redefine how Chicago’s public workforce development system serves all low-skilled, low-income job seekers. Opportunity Chicago’s overarching strategic priorities aim to simultaneously:

Expand and enhance the existing workforce service delivery system to maximize employment opportunities for CHA residents;
Promote innovative employment skills and training programs;
Engage employers in the design and execution of sector- or industry-based partnerships;
Advocate for public policies that support sustainable improvements to the public workforce development system; and
Evaluate the initiative’s effectiveness and determine the relevance of its model for other low-income communities and populations.

Chicago Public Housing and the Plan for Transformation

Opportunity Chicago is collaborative by design, and its success as a model stems largely from this approach. It was co-founded by the CHA, the City of Chicago and The Partnership for New Communities – a group of business, foundation and civic partners that supports the people and places most affected by the Plan – who came together to establish a new approach to workforce development for Chicago’s public housing residents. (See more at Our Partners.)

Goals: Addressing the Needs

Opportunity Chicago addresses both individual- and systems-level barriers to employment and economic self-sufficiency. Many CHA residents face significant hurdles to employment, despite having the desire and potential to advance. Among those obstacles is navigating Chicago’s complicated workforce development system, where it historically has been difficult to find employment-related services that fit most residents’ needs. Opportunity Chicago has developed a strong understanding of these needs and how programs and systems can be improved to serve them. With this understanding and the help of its Strategic Advisers, Opportunity Chicago developed the following set of goals:

Place 5,000 residents into jobs in five years;
Offer a range of employment services;
Work in key industry sectors;
Focus on self-sufficiency through employment;
Streamline services;
Engage employers in new ways;
Identify and address gaps in services;
Provide a more efficient model; and
Document the model and lessons learned.

Outcomes: Numbers at a Glance

Opportunity Chicago invested $27.5 million, committed to a continuous improvement model, and has surpassed its goal of placing 5,000 individuals in jobs over five years by 16 percent. A few key outcomes are below; for additional outcomes information please refer to the Our Successes page.

$27.5 million invested over 5 years
Over 85 percent of funding spent on funding work readiness, skills training, and job placement
5,696 residents placed in jobs
926 residents completed certificate and degree programs through City Colleges of Chicago
206 participated in Contextualized (workplace) Literacy
178 participated in Industry Skills Training
1,487 participated in Transitional Jobs
Nearly 20 providers delivered employment programs

* data through April 2010

What Happens After 2010?

From the start, Opportunity Chicago and its advisors were thinking beyond the life of the initiative to ensure that lessons learned, effective programs, and systems coordination would be sustained in the long run.

In 2009, Opportunity Chicago created a Policy and Sustainability Working Group to focus on Opportunity Chicago’s systemic policy improvement goals. This group presented five recommendations to the Chicago Workforce Investment Council, which monitors the investment of millions of public dollars in workforce training, to address the need for change in Chicago’s workforce development system.

Opportunity Chicago is slated to end in December 2010, but its dedicated partners will continue to help ensure that programs and services established through Opportunity Chicago are integrated into the city’s workforce development system, funding streams are better aligned and resources are used more efficiently. These partners will also use the lessons learned from Opportunity Chicago to inform federal and state advocacy. For more information on the system-wide improvements that have been accomplished and the plan for serving CHA residents in the future, please refer to the Our Successes page.

Publications

Opportunity Chicago - Sectors Matter: Effective Training Requires an Industry Focus (Full Brief)

Opportunity Chicago - Sectors Matter: Effective Training Requires an Industry Focus (Four-Page Brief)

Opportunity Chicago - Making the Workforce System Work for Public Housing Residents: How Lessons from Opportunity Chicago Can Inform Rethinking the Workforce Investment Act of 1998

Opportunity Chicago - A Partnership for Change

Opportunity Chicago - A Partnership for Change Press Release

Opportunity Chicago - A Partnership for Change PowerPoint Presentation

Opportunity Chicago Career Pathways Posters

Opportunity Chicago Industry Sector Brochures

Healthcare

Hospitality - Hotel

Hospitality - Restaurant