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Health care careers provide family-sustaining wages, excellent benefits, and potential for professional growth. By developing health career pipelines for young people, adult community residents and incumbent workers, Partners and its hospitals create employment and advancement opportunities that enable individuals to achieve economic self-sufficiency and contribute to the economic health of their communities. These investments in human capital in turn enable Partners hospitals to develop and retain a highly qualified, diverse workforce.
Kwame Adams and SSJP Mentor Vijay Vanguri, MD in the BWH Pathology Department. 98% of SSJP seniors pursue a college education after graduating the program.
BWH’s Student Success Jobs Program (SSJP) was one of five collaborative projects for improving community health nationwide that received a prestigious NOVA award from American Hospital Association.
At BWH, the Student Success Jobs Program (SSJP) is an intensive year-round employment and mentoring internship program for students of Boston public high schools. The program introduces students from the city’s lowest-income communities to careers in health care, science and medicine by offering paid internships within the hospital. Now in its eighth year, the program creates pathways into science, health or medicine careers for those who have traditionally been underrepresented in the field.
SSJP is distinctive in that works on three levels to improve community health - by contributing to educational achievement for young people, enabling employment opportunity in communities of greatest need as well as increasing the diversity of the healthcare workforce as SSJP students proceed forward in their career. SSJP is comprised of multiple components that support the educational and social growth of participants. Aside from internships and mentoring from health care professionals, SSJP students attend monthly seminars, participate in academic tutoring, receive financial college scholarships and assistance with the college application process and have the opportunity to shadow physicians, nurses and other health care professionals in the emergency department, operating room and during patient rounds.
The outcomes have been impressive, with 98 percent of SSJP high school seniors pursuing a college education after graduating and 94 percent of these students majoring in science, medical or health related fields of study.
MGH Center for Community Health Improvement has worked with the Boston Public Schools to offer underserved and underrepresented youth a wide range of opportunities in science and health careers. MGH sustains this commitment not only because it is the right thing to do, but also as a strategy to develop a more diverse, informed, academically prepared and skilled workforce. MGH Center for Community Health Improvement has partnered with the James P. Timilty Middle School, East Boston High School, and Health Careers Academy, and is the second largest summer employer of Boston youth.
MGH School Partnerships have significant impact:
- Over 1,000 students benefit each year.
- One hundred percent of ProTech graduates pursue post-secondary degree programs.
- $15,000 in scholarships are awarded each year to graduating seniors.
- 170 students participate in the Summer Jobs program, making MGH the number one employer of youth in the city of Boston within the healthcare sector.
Partners in Career and Workforce Development (PCWD) website
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