Per Scholas\u2019<\/a> bootcamps last for a course of 12-15 weeks. And per Jeremy Garren, the Managing Director of the Orlando campus, located in a high rise along South Orange Avenue, it\u2019s an opportunity for \u201clearners\u201d to hone their skills, or even \u201cupskill\u201d to transition into higher-wage jobs.<\/p>\nThat is precisely what Faith Donaldson did, graduating with her second certificate from Per Scholas in February, this time in cyber security.<\/p>\n
\u201cBeing in a place where I could get into tech and be a woman of color in tech and that meant so much,\u201d she said, continuing, \u201cBecause it\u2019s like, hey, here\u2019s a path that other young women can sit here and look at and say, \u2018Faith did it, I can do it too.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
For many years, the young woman from South Florida was like many of the other \u201clearners\u201d in the program: working jobs without a career, or perhaps direction.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was working mornings at Starbucks and nights at Olive Garden. Somebody told me about tech. But I was just like, \u2018OK, how do I get into it?\u2019\u201d she recalled. \u201cI had nothing to lose. Like I was working two jobs. I was burnt out\u2026 at age 21.\u201d<\/p>\n
And when that person mentioned Per Scholas and the notion of tuition-free learning, Donaldson could not wait to tell her biggest supporter: her mother.<\/p>\n
All her life, Donaldson looked up to her mother, a single mom raising five brothers and sisters. Donaldson also saw years of setbacks, especially financial struggles, pressing on her hard-working mother, but the woman eventually finding success as a manager at a local grocery store.<\/p>\n
\u201cOh, she means the world. Like, she actually was my backbone throughout this process. Yeah, when times got tough, you know, just leaving my job, going to this program, my mom was supporting me throughout the whole entire thing,\u201d she said. \u201cShe could cry in the bathroom, but the next day, my mom was back at it \u2026. seeing somebody get back up with the same strength, the same energy and pushing through.\u201d<\/p>\n
It strengthened Donaldson\u2019s resolve to change her own life, push aside fears and enter the program.<\/p>\n
According to Garren, funding for Per Scholas comes from a variety of sources, from local partnerships and foundations to national organizations and private individuals. The nonprofit boasts dozens of locations across the country, where students not only learn requisite IT skills, they also expand their soft skills, from interviewing to networking.<\/p>\n
In addition, more than 80% of Per Scholas graduates, Garren said, find full-time employment within one year of graduating from the training program.<\/p>\n
Seeing \u201clearners\u201d success post-graduation has kept Garren himself motivated to continue the work for the past four years. He relishes ringing a large silver bell hoisted in the lobby of the Orlando campus, signaling that a student has attained a job in the industry.<\/p>\n
\u201cI always love to kind of look back and know that, you know, we did have some impact on individuals,\u201d he explained. \u201cWe are posed with doing a lot with very little resources, right? And so for us, and for me, to be able to impact individuals in a short amount of time is \u2026 why I do what I do.\u201d<\/p>\n
For Donaldson, who aims to one day work for the federal government as an analyst, much of why she does what she does is down to her mother, whose faith in the IT professional never wavered.<\/p>\n
\u201cShe will be taken care of because she has given me everything. She will give me the clothes off her back,\u201d she said of her mother. \u201cSo, yeah, she deserves it all.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"ORLANDO, Fla. \u2014\u00a0A nonprofit organization based on IT learning is giving students a leg up in the industry,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":199128,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[1011,2031,15636,274,558,15464,1190,960,15465,115,139,141,140,1576,278],"class_list":["post-199127","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-orlando","tag-app-human-interest","tag-app-local-business","tag-app-money-tech","tag-app-top-stories","tag-business","tag-florida-inspires","tag-human-interest","tag-jobs","tag-julie-gargotta","tag-news","tag-orlando","tag-orlando-headlines","tag-orlando-news","tag-technology","tag-top-stories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/199127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=199127"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/199127\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/199128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=199127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=199127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-fl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=199127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}