Shreveport, LA - It takes many individuals to make Goodwill Industries' mission succeed: employees, board members, donors, shoppers, clients, students, and community partners. Each one is necessary and vital to help Goodwill run smooth and effectively.

To culminate the end of May as Goodwill Month, Goodwill will be hosting its 95th Anniversary Community Awards Luncheon on Thursday, June 10, 2021 at 11:30am at Sam's Town Hotel and Casino.

As part of the event, several business and community leader volunteers will be honored and recognized for improving people's lives through the power of work. This year's businesses and individual honorees includes: Arthur J. Gallagher; Heard, McElroy & Vestal; Dollar Mania; Council on Alcoholism & Drug Abuse (CADA); Mrs. Bonnie Moore, City of Shreveport Community Development Director; Former Senator Ryan Gatti; and Caddo Commissioner John Atkins; Mr. RJ Johnson; Ms. Sarah Brossette and Ms. Kasei Collins.

In 2020, even in spite of the COVID pandemic, more than 1,075 individuals people visited a Goodwill Job Center seeking employment assistance in one of the 20 different workforce development programs offered throughout the 26 parishes of North Louisiana. Goodwill knows that the work conducted each day at our Job Centers makes a real impact on the community and lives are changed forever because of it.

To learn more about the event, to sponsor or purchase tables or tickets, please visit Goodwill's website at: www.goodwillnla.org or via Eventbrite at: https://bit.ly/3ais7Fz.

The following is a news release from Goodwill Industries of North Louisiana:

The recent articles on NPR and the AP newswires, have compelled Goodwill Industries of North Louisiana to assure our generous community: Goodwill absolutely wants your "junk." And, on behalf of our fellow local, nonprofit leaders who, in this community fund critical programs and services by selling donated goods, they want your gently used items too.

Goodwill would like to address any confusion that may have resulted from this story. While an executive with Goodwill Industries International was quoted in the story to confirm the wonderful increase in donations being enjoyed by the 156 locally governed, independent Goodwill territories across the country, no one from any charity that sells donated goods "admonished" the public about the quality of their donations.

While you may no longer want what you donate, we most certainly do. Goodwill, and other such social enterprises, depend on donated goods to support mission services. To oversimplify, we get stuff, we sell stuff, and we change lives. At GINLA, none of your generous donations go to waste. Items not sold or not saleable in our stores and online platform are recycled or baled and sold as salvage. We do all of this in a socially responsible way, always diverting what would typically be sent to the landfill.

No matter how we sell your donations, we generate revenue to fund the reason why we do what we do - create job opportunities for people with barriers to employment. Every day your donations are converted to revenue that is critical to our mission. Your donations are transformed into real money invested into our community's programs and services.

This leads to measurable and meaningful results for North Louisiana. Over the past three years, Goodwill has served almost 5,600 area residents just through its various job training programs. Whether it is an unemployed person who may have a disability, a neighbor recovering from substance abuse, or someone who may have served prison time for a nonviolent crime, Goodwill is proud to help them overcome their barriers to employment.
We are not alone. Collectively, the largest social enterprises that operate retail outlets in our region rely on your donated goods so they can also convert them into revenue to support their respective work in the community. Together, our impact is important - and impossible without your donations.
The scale on which Goodwill receives and sells your donated goods and put the proceeds to work serving the nation's communities, is staggering. Goodwill Industries is comprised of more than 3,300 independently operated retail locations, nationwide.

Last year, the sale of your donated goods led to 288,000 people getting back to work. Our friends at nonprofit community resale services and GINLA rely on your donations to continue this important work.

In the midst of the 'shecession' and immense job loss, corporate America and nonprofit joining forces to put people back to work.

Shreveport, LA - Goodwill, the leading workforce provider in North America, today announced a new, first-of-its-kind coalition called Rising Together™, which will work to create an equitable economic recovery and provide job seekers with the skills and supports needed to access sustainable jobs. Joining Goodwill with a goal of empowering one million people to access sustainable careers by 2025 are Fortune 50 companies and global philanthropic and business leaders, including the Anthem Foundation, Coursera, Google, Indeed and Lyft.

Together, Goodwill and its partners are providing resources to address the widening skills gap and the negative impact of the economic downturn brought on by the pandemic. The Rising Together™ coalition will provide a combination of holistic workforce services and supports, as well as build and expand upon programs that address the inequities and systemic barriers facing workers in our society the most. According to the U.S. Department of Labor's Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS), 2.3 million women have left the labor force, a phenomenon that is being called the 'shecession,' and many others remain out of work and without the skills needed to gain new employment. Nationwide, pandemic-related job loss has also had a disproportionate impact on Black and Hispanic men and women as well as those who do not have post-high school education.

These powerhouse brands are on the frontlines of America's workforce, hiring thousands of new employees each year. The coalition will use its combined hiring strength to support the holistic needs of job seekers - from providing essential transportation and broadband access to offering training opportunities and job search skills.

Rising Together™ jump-starts a vision for a future where there is a pathway to opportunity that is accessible by all. Together with Goodwill:
Anthem Foundation will launch a healthcare career path training that will benefit thousands of individuals over the course of two years. The program will build healthcare employee pipelines while supporting healthcare workers affected by the pandemic. The training will ultimately lead to credentials, job placements, wage increases and benefits.

Coursera, through its social impact program, will provide 2,000 scholarships to those hard-hit by the economic turndown, including people who are impacted by the criminal justice system, veterans and youth learners. Scholarship recipients will have free access to 4,000 courses as well as hands-on projects and professional certificates that teach job-relevant skills across business, technology and data science.

Google will continue to support Goodwill in its efforts to deliver digital skills training across the United States through programs such as Google Career Certificates, which help job seekers prepare for in-demand jobs in less than six months without the need for a college degree or prior experience. Since 2017, more than 100 local Goodwill organizations have implemented the Goodwill Digital Career Accelerator® in their communities, equipping more than one million people with digital skills and placing more than 170,000 of those individuals into employment.

Indeed will help job seekers who are often overlooked or face challenges to finding work with skills-based assessments, job seeker support and employer hiring events. Indeed will work with Goodwill on a fellowship for women who have had to leave the workforce or were reduced to part-time work due to COVID-19 (either voluntarily or involuntarily). Goodwill's collaboration with Indeed will also include the launch of the Indeed + Goodwill Digital Resource Guide, which will equip Goodwill organizations with best practices and recommendations on how to help people find jobs at Goodwill organizations and other employers.
Lyft will continue investing in its LyftUp Jobs Access program, which launched in 2019 with a coalition of partners including Goodwill, to provide individuals access to the transportation they need to get to interviews, job training and/or the first weeks of work. To date, the program has supported job seekers with access to tens of thousands of rides.

"As we celebrate Mother's Day, millions of women, mothers and families across North America are struggling, even as the country works toward recovery," said David Tinkis, President & CEO of Goodwill Industries of North Louisiana. "We believe that everyone deserves the opportunity to thrive in life, but, today, too many people are left out of that opportunity. We must ensure that people can equip themselves with the skills they need to compete for jobs in a changing economy. The Rising Together™ coalition is providing training and other critical services directly to the communities who need them the most."

Goodwill is embedded in every community across North America, and more than 24 million people receive support from the nonprofit annually. These supports include both in-person and virtual career supports, including job training, mentoring, career fairs, classes and job placement; and access to other assistance, such as child care and transportation. The Goodwill brand has a nearly 120-year history and can provide what is needed in times of economic crises, recessions and moments of social distress. Goodwill Industries of North Louisiana has been providing those critical services for 95 years.
To view Goodwill and its partners' commitments to an equitable recovery and to hear from the coalition's executives, visit Goodwill.org/Rising-Together.

"Providing in-demand skills and credentials in a field like healthcare will help people enter a career path that leads to economic stability," said Felicia Norwood, executive vice president and president, government business division for Anthem, Inc. "This is a huge step in empowering families struggling with housing insecurity, lack of access to food and healthcare, and much more. The Anthem Foundation is proud to work with Goodwill and the Rising Together™ coalition to help lift people up and provide the opportunity to thrive."

"Through the Jobs Access program and our work with Goodwill, we know that more than half of the program's participants are women," said Lisa Boyd, director of social impact at Lyft. "We also know that for women who are unemployed or underemployed, reliable transportation to a job interview, job training or the first few weeks of work can mean the difference between successful, long-term employment and lost opportunities, which is why continuing our partnership is critical to helping women get back to work."

"Too many women and families are being left behind amid the pandemic, and without robust solutions, it will be difficult for them to catch up," said Abbey Carlton, head of social impact at Indeed. "With Rising Together™, we are proud to offer access to key services such as job placement support, leadership training and development, and more to help empower people within their own communities to thrive."

"A growing number of well-paying, entry-level jobs require digital skills that can be learned online," said Jeff Maggioncalda, CEO of Coursera. "Together with Goodwill, our scholarship initiative will provide communities hardest hit by the pandemic with free access to job-relevant learning that prepares them to enter high-demand fields."

"Since 2017, Google.org has supported Goodwill with more than $15 million in grants to help advance their delivery of digital skills training to more than one million people across the United States," said Hector Mujica, economic opportunity lead for Google.org. "We are proud to continue to support Goodwill as they work to create greater access to high-growth, high-paying jobs in the digital economy through training programs, including the Google Career Certificates."