For the past 2 summers, the Workforce Planning Board of Waterloo Wellington Dufferin has tracked youth summer employment and found varying numbers of youth engagement year-to-year and region to region. There is no consistent picture around what youth, especially those 15 to 24, are doing.
In our labour market consultations, data presented showed that young women in the same age group tended to do better in the market than young men. More men were removing themselves which may echo a trend in the United States where 7 million young men have totally disengaged from work. At the same time, there is unprecedented information around in-demand roles and jobs with lots of opportunity.
An investigation will help provide a snapshot as to what is happening with youth and what may be missing to better support them to stay in the labour market. By gathering data around youth and their engagement in the labour market, we hope to identify who is available, who is attending education and who is not actively seeking work or education.
Research will be done alongside youth sessions and community stakeholder sessions.
With the youth sessions, we are looking for the youth voice in determining where the struggles are to labour market participation and what supports are lacking. Connecting with the stakeholders who support youth can help us determine where the disconnect in youth need, labour market demand and educational or employment services is happening. This can then provide our communities with opportunities to pursue and secure programming that aligns with youth need and labour market demands or activate tools that would support youth and employers in connecting thereby closing that engagement gap.
To connect on this project please contact Bennett MacDonald at bennett@workforceplanningboard.com
To see previous research based on youth click HERE
