Oklahoma City
Suited For Success in Oklahoma City recently received the Outstanding Business/Industry Partner Award from the Oklahoma Career and Technical Education Equity Council.
The organization was one of four businesses and organizations honored along with 12 Oklahomans at the 27th annual Making It Work Day at the Capitol in a virtual ceremony April 30. Making It Work Day recognizes individuals who are committed to removing barriers to success for single-parent families by providing educational experiences for students beyond the classroom. The ceremony also recognized nontraditional students.
Suited For Success is a not-for-profit organization that serves women in the Oklahoma City metro by providing professional dress and other career services for job seekers who identify as female, said Alli Canfield, coordinator of the BEST Program at Metro Technology Centers, who nominated the organization for the award.
Suited For Success allows BEST to refer its clients twice for free clothing and job preparation services, Canfield said. During the first referral, Suited For Success staff members help students get two work appropriate outfits, including accessories, and during the second, they provide students with two interview outfits, she said.
In addition, Canfield said, Suited For Success provided an internship for a BEST administrative assistant graduate.
OkCTEEC is affiliated with the administrative division of the Oklahoma Association of Career and Technology Education. The council advocates for students pursuing nontraditional careers and for resources for educating single parents.
“The Making It Work Day ceremony is such an important part of OkCTEEC as it publicly acknowledges those students, programs and business partners that have done an outstanding job meeting their career goals,” said KayTee Niquette, Work Prep and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families coordinator at the Oklahoma Department of Career and Technology Education. “The event this year is even more important, as we have persevered through a pandemic and still have individuals who have excelled.”
She serves as an adviser for OkCTEEC, along with Lisa French of the Department of Human Services and Gina McPherson of the Oklahoma State Regents for Higher Education.
The COVID-19 pandemic created challenges, said Lisa D. Brown, OkCTEEC president and director for career transitions at Oklahoma City Community College, but students, faculty, staff and community partners met the challenges head-on, redesigning traditional methods of assistance and education.
“These students have persevered through the many changes in their pursuit of their goals and even some events in their own families,” she said. “In addition to their academic success, they have strengthened even more skills in communication, collaboration, adaptation and endurance that will be of great benefit as valuable life skills they will never forget they developed or discovered they had.”
OkCTEEC’s purposes include promoting and supporting career and technology education, increasing its effectiveness, promoting research in the field and in educational equity, developing leadership and advocating for equity and diversity.
For more information about OkCTEEC, visit https://www.cteec.org/okcteec. For more information about the Oklahoma Department of Career and Technology Education, visit www.okcareertech.org.
