With more than a decade’s worth of experience hosting career days, Holy Family Ministries of North Lawndale “made an intentional effort throughout the years to start shifting to speakers who represent the students,” said Cheryl Collins, CEO of Holy Family Ministries, meaning they’re focusing on students of color.
Holy Family Ministries’ latest event, held last Friday, was for the Holy Family School of kindergarteners through eighth graders and the Little Learner’s Academy, its early childhood education program.
And while Holy Family Ministries have organized career day since 2007, it has shifted to inviting only Black speakers in the last few years, according to Collins.
In 2021, when career day went virtual for a year because of the pandemic, Holy Family decided to link it with Black History Month, calling it “Black History in the Making Career Day at Holy Family,” a title that has since stuck.
The decision for the change was deliberate. Holy Family Ministries’ student body of 320 preschoolers through eighth graders are around 99% Black and 1% mixed or Latino, Collins said.
“We made a decision in 2021 that the speakers would be African American,” Collins said. “If I’m honest, most of the speakers were not Black when we first started this, but we made an intentional effort throughout the years to start shifting to speakers who represent the students they’re speaking to.”
Collins was Holy Family School’s principal when career day started in 2007 and said she noticed that all the students yearned to have the same jobs.
“When you would ask the children what they wanted to be when they grew up, you got the boys with NBA player or something sports-related, and the girls would typically say, ‘teacher, nurse, doctor,’” Collins said. “It was clear to see they didn’t have a lens for other careers.”
“If they go into a professional place, whether it’s a hospital or a clinic, or if they are invited into a legal office or something of that nature, they don’t often see people who look like them,” Collins said. “We wanted them to be aware of the vast array of things that they could become as they matriculated into high school.”
Because no one can be sure what careers these children will have — some may not even exist yet — career day speakers visit each classroom for about 30 minutes to discuss what led them to their job and what students can do to prepare now.
“They really focus on education, doing well at school, paying attention to your teachers, discovering your passion, following it, getting better at something,” Collins said. The speakers aim to help students discover their talents and strengths, both inside and outside the classroom.
Even the preschoolers at the facility’s Little Learner’s Academy get a bit of face time with the speakers, who mainly interact with these students by showing them tools they use at their job.
This year’s career day speakers included an electrical engineer from Radio Flyer, a family outreach coordinator from Argonne National Laboratory, a private banker at BMO Wealth Management, an account manager at Pinterest, a musician educator and someone who works at a publishing house.
Speakers usually have connections to Holy Family Ministries staff or are in the surrounding community. In the past, the school has hosted a doctor from the Lawndale Christian Health Center two doors down and someone who owns a nearby restaurant.
After career day, classrooms discuss their favorite speakers and what students learned. While it’s difficult to measure the success of Holy Family’s changing career day goals, Collins said feedback from students has been positive, especially since more of the speakers look like them.
“I think that’s made a difference in a shift in their ability to see themselves,” Collins said.
Holy Family School is recruiting for the upcoming school year. Apply online at https://www.hfm.org/.