The Collective Blueprint, a Memphis-based workforce development nonprofit, is set to team up with Google to offer a no-experience-required opportunity for 50 Memphians aged 18-30 years old to invest in tech skills and earn Google Career Certificates for no cost starting this January.
“Being able to provide this opportunity for free, so folks don’t have to pay for it is a big deal,” said Sabrina Dawson, vice president of programs for The Collective Blueprint.
The Grow with Google program is a three-to-six-month self-paced course taught by Google employees that allows students to develop new careers or further careers in cybersecurity, digital marketing, IT support, data analytics, and other fields.
In addition to an education, Grow with Google provides other career resources like career coaching, interview practice, and access to their hiring partners.
Beyond career resources provided by Google, students will have access to The Collective Blueprints' career supports, including soft-skills training.
This additional support is important, Dawson said, so that “folks feel confident and comfortable moving forward after they have gotten a hard-skill certification.”
According to Google, 70% of its 200,000 graduates have reported a positive career outcome within six months of earning a certificate.
“It provides access,” Dawson said. “It opens the world up to people and opportunities.”
While Memphis has fewer tech jobs than the average U.S. city, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Dawson said that most graduates of The Collective Blueprint's other programs have been able to find local or virtual tech jobs, allowing them to stay in Memphis.
Southern Communities Initiative, a consortium of companies with the mission of advancing racial parity, brokered the deal to offer these opportunities for The Collective Blueprint in Memphis and for its partner organizations in New Orleans, Birmingham, and Houston.
“We have to prepare people in our communities for careers in emerging technologies if we are ever going to close the skills gap and build wealth,” said Mambu Sherman, executive director of Southern Communities Initiative, in a news release.
In addition to the Grow with Google program, The Collective Blueprint offers other opportunities for young adults to advance their tech careers, including a nine-month coding program that has a new cohort also starting in January.
