1961 US Commission on Civil Rights Report Book 2 - University of ...

white farm children. 29 The parent organization is privately financed.
It provides a full-time director for the program.
The Careers Unlimited approach is to establish "Career Clubs" in
public schools serving children in grades 7 through 12 as an extracurricular
activity. Teachers and principals are requested to select as
club members students having sufficient potential ability to permit them
to pursue a business or technical career. Membership is kept sufficiently
broad to avoid unpleasant "minority" connotations, yet selective enough
to make it an honor.
Club meetings are held on the school grounds every 2 weeks during
or immediately after school. The organization supplies speakers to discuss
various business and professional careers and their educational
requirements. Meetings are informal and youngsters have an opportunity
to ask questions. Monthly field trips introduce the students to
the climate of a particular career. They visit plants, factories, hospitals,
laboratories, colleges, etc., to see who does what and under what conditions
and to make on-the-spot inquiries.
At present there are 10 Career Clubs in eight elementary schools for
seventh- and eighth-grade students, and in two high schools for ninthgrade
students. Eventually, it is hoped, the program will handle 400-
500 students in grades 7 through 12.
To reduce a high dropout rate, Careers Unlimited gives $75 per-year
scholarships to selected students to keep them in school. Future plans
include summer career camps, vocational guidance publications, films,
and radio programs—and finally, perhaps, in-school, basic-skills
training.
The secretary of the organization wrote the <strong>Commission</strong> that its sponsors
feel the program fulfills a threefold need: "
. . . We are helping the children to reveal their up to now untapped
talents; we are raising their goals and aspirations; we are
preparing the community (by participation in this program) to
be more ready to accept these children into the job market once
their educational goals have been met.
The tie-in of this program with local business and professional leaders
gives promise of nondiscriminatory employment opportunities. In this
respect it is, so far as the <strong>Commission</strong> knows, unique.
SPECIFIC PROGRAMS
Most of the programs discussed above are particularly applicable to the
Negro pupil who has arrived at a desegregated school for the first time.
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