Gibbs Scores First Platinum Work Ready Mark in Worth County
SYLVESTER, GA. Beki Rogers of Poulan was put to the test during the month of October 2008. First, she was planning a wedding, with all its associated busyness and obstacles. Second, she took the Work Ready Assessment through the State of Georgia Work Ready initiative in hopes of landing a job with the City of Sylvester.
By November, she not only had a new last name, Gibbs, but she also had a new job as an administrative assistant in the City’s Code Enforcement and Housing Department supporting Angel Gray, the Sylvester code enforcement officer.
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Beki Rogers Gibbs, left, achieved the highest score on record on the Work Ready Assessment in Worth County through the state’s Certified Work Ready initiative as administered through Moultrie Technical College. Her platinum level score helped secure her new job in the City of Sylvester Code Enforcement Department. Gibbs is pictured with Moultrie Tech’s Coordinator of Business & Industry Services, Katie Harrison, right. |
For Gibbs, 21, this was not her first time working with the City. She had worked there as a secretary in the past but was not asked to take an assessment until she applied for the recent Code Enforcement job opening.
That’s because Worth County received a $35,000 state grant in July 2008 and is working to earn the status as a Certified Work Ready Community, a designation showing the county has the talented workforce that business demands and the educational infrastructure to drive economic growth and prosperity. Moultrie Technical College is the administrator of the grant and is responsible for coordinating the Work Ready Assessment.
Georgia’s Work Ready initiative is based upon the assessment that Gibbs took as well as certification for job seekers and a job profiling system for businesses. The test measures math, reading and locating skills as well as personal and workplace behaviors and attitudes. It is designed to help identify strengths and weaknesses, including work ethics, in order to ensure success in the workplace. By identifying both the needs of business and the available skills of Georgia’s workforce, the certified counties can more effectively generate the right talent for the right jobs.
To be designated a Certified Work Ready Community counties must demonstrate a commitment to improving public high school graduation rates and drive current workers
and the unemployed to obtain a Work Ready Certificate which can be received after successfully completing the assessment.
Gibbs took the assessment after the first interview for the Code Enforcement job. She did so at the request of the City of Sylvester, and she achieved a platinum level score - the highest level attainable on the Work Ready Assessment. She was also the first test-taker in Worth County to reach platinum status.
After hearing her score, she says she thought, “It must be wrong. Certainly someone else must have done that.”
Upon her second interview for the job, she says, “My score on the personality and talent parts of the test really helped me.”
Her interviewer told her that the score on that portion of the test reflected that she was an honest person, and honesty was very important in this position and to the City of Sylvester offices.
She also scored particularly high in the areas of cooperation, striving, creativity, order and sociability – all skills that are important in her new position dealing with the public through the Code Enforcement office.
The Code Enforcement division is responsible for examining sites, determining any code violations, coordinating with property owners for corrective action, ensuring compliance with municipal codes and regulations, and interpreting and applying zone ordinances and building, health and safety codes. The department also responds to questions and concerns from the public and helps to resolve issues and complaints.
Of her new job, Gibbs says, “I enjoy the people I work with. We educate the public on violations and help them get in compliance. We also take their complaints and help them work through them.”
Katie Harrison, coordinator of business and industry services for Moultrie Tech, said of Gibbs, “The fact that she took the initiative to take the test and that the City of Sylvester asked their job applicants to take the test was great.”
For more information on the Work Ready initiative and the Work Ready Assessment in Worth County, contact Katie Harrison at (229) 217-4257.
