Program & Grants
Employment
Helping families and individuals move out of poverty
The Fry Foundation’s Employment program supports comprehensive job training programs that help low-income individuals improve their ability to compete for living-wage jobs and careers.
What we fund
Our funding focuses on:
Vocational Training: The Fry Foundation continues to invest in vocational training as a key tool for helping low-income job seekers secure middle-skilled jobs which offer good wages and career advancement potential. Middle-skilled jobs comprise the largest number of available jobs in Illinois. Training programs also provide job retention support to participants for at least six months after placement on the job. The strongest programs track participants for a full year.
Pre-Employment Training: In the pre-employment training category, the Fry Foundation funds a limited number of high performing grantee partners that are especially effective at helping hard-to-place job seekers enter the labor market for the first time or after a long absence. Though there are hundreds of pre-employment programs across Chicago, the Fry Foundation funds grantee partners that serve as examples for other programs to follow.
Within the Vocational Training priority area, we look for programs that have:
Typically serve job seekers who have a high school diploma or GED, some work experience, and math and reading skills at a ninth-grade level or above.
Specialize in training that prepares participants for jobs in high growth industries (e.g., manufacturing; healthcare; transportation, distribution, and logistics).
Use labor market information to target middle-skill jobs that offer a living wage and a career pathway. A career pathway is a sequence of steps (either in education or employment) that advance to higher-paying and higher-skilled jobs.
Develop and maintain strategic partnerships with employers that hire participants. The strongest programs in the portfolio have employer advisory committees that participate in the design of training curricula to ensure participants graduate with the skills that employers need and desire.
Employ instructors with deep industry experience and skills.
Within the Pre-Employment Training priority area, we look for programs that:
Help individuals with significant barriers to employment (e.g., history of homelessness, justice involvement) gain employment in entry level jobs. Develop and maintain strong relationships with employers that lead to job placement opportunities for participants.
Offer hands-on job skills training or work-based learning as options in their program design.
Provide high levels of support services that address specific barriers to employment for the populations they serve. These include, but are not limited to housing referrals, financial coaching, conflict management training, mental health supports, and childcare options. These services are offered while a participant is in training and after placement in a job and are designed to increase the likelihood that participants will be able to secure and retain employment.
Policy Advocacy
We also recognize the need to improve the overall effectiveness of the workforce development system. We welcome applications for policy advocacy efforts to increase access to education, training, and jobs for low-income adults; and improve the quality of job training and education programs. Policy Advocacy efforts lend a collective voice to the concerns of job seekers, workers and the organizations that serve them.
The Fry Foundation has helped us on our trajectory of tremendous growth. The Fry Foundation provides flexible operating funds that allow us to be innovative. And when you have a funder that thinks about what else they can do for you beyond the money, that’s just gold.”
—Manny Rodriguez, Co-Founder and Executive Director, Revolution Workshop
What we do not fund
While the Fry Foundation is committed to enhancing employment outcomes, there are certain areas we generally do not support:
College access and internship programs: We do not fund individual scholarships, internships and entities that collect tuition.
Job readiness only: Programs must ensure that training and skills development efforts are focused on placing adults in jobs that have a clear career path to higher wages in growing industries in Chicago.
Workforce development programs outside of Chicago: Programs must benefit the labor market and constituents in Chicago.