The agenda for this past week’s class included a debrief of the Casa de Manana Senior Dance, current event presentations, and the remaining oral history presentations. Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to attend the dance with my cohort because of another class and I really wish I had been able to go. From the debrief discussion, it seemed like they had a great time dancing with each other and interacting with some of Casa’s residents. I look forward to seeing the photos that were taken from that evening. Hearing about how the Casa dance went just makes me more excited for the dance at Gary and Mary West Center that’s coming up very soon! After the Casa event debrief, we moved on to the current event presentations straight away and my group was up first. My group covered an article about a senior job fair that happened just the day before in Austin, Texas. The purpose of the job fair was to connect senior citizens with employers who are interested in hiring them as finding jobs has become difficult for this particular population. In searching for more information, our group learned that there is a stigma against older populations in regards to their ability to keep up with the modern changes applied in many businesses today. Some employers are requiring certain qualifications that effectively filter out senior citizen job applicants. In one article, one woman said that a potential employer had abruptly ended a call with her after she told him when she had graduated from high school. How can we address the stigma that seniors are unable to keep up with modernized businesses and therefore incompetent employees? How can we assist this community as they seek employment just like everyone else? When I asked myself the latter question, I thought of the many workshops and resources available to us college-aged students here at UCSD. I wonder if and how similar workshops and “career center”-like facilities targeted specifically for older populations that address their specific needs could become available to them today.
Claudia MabantaWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. Archives
June 2019
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