Lack of proper clothing is often a barrier to securing and sustaining decent jobs for economically disadvantaged women. Dress for Success is an organization that seeks to tear down the barrier by providing free clothing to women in need.
Networked Effort to Providing Free Clothes
Dress for Success operates as a network of affiliates with each affiliate location having a charitable status. All of the free clothing is provided by tax deductible donations made to local offices. In the United States, their offices are primarily located in major metropolitan areas such as New York, Boston, Washington, DC, Los Angeles, Atlanta, and Miami.
Distributing the Clothes
As far as the clients are concerned, Dress for Success is only accessible by way of referrals from job training agencies, domestic violence organizations, homeless shelters, and other types of community social service agencies. The referring agency will identify a woman they feel will benefit from the use of free clothing, then they write out a referral for their client to make an appointment to shop for clothes.
When the client arrives at her local Dress for Success location, she is greeted by a volunteer who assists her in picking out appropriate attire for the specific job she is pursing. The clients are given an entire outfit, complete with shoes, and other accessories if they are available at the time of their appointment.
The purpose of the initial free clothing assistance is to enable the client to get through an interview, another set of clothing is given to the client after she has landed her job.
The Legacy and Global Impact of Dress for Success
According to their website, Dress for Success has served more than 45,000 women since 1997. The agency provides free clothes to women in the United States., Canada, Mexico, the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, the West Indies, and Poland.
Most of the local offices have incorporated a career center, complete with Internet-enabled computers for job searches and resume-writing assistance. Many of the women who volunteer their time to clients in the career centers have come from a diverse pool of professional backgrounds, from human resources specialists to job developers.
Beginning in 2010, the organization has embarked upon a plan to incorporate a Health and Wellness Program. The program will provide information about women's health issues, and educate them about healthy lifestyle concepts. Recently, Aetna has decided to partner with Dress for Success in their Health and Wellness Program initiative. Together with the help of countless volunteers, generous donations, corporate sponsors, referring agencies, and local affiliates, Dress for Success has emerged as a powerful positive force in the lives of disadvantaged women.
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Dress For Success Worldwide Partners with Aetna
Rachelle Williams - Rachelle Williams has been writing on the web for 2 years. In addition to Suite101, Rachelle Williams is a contributing writer for Demand ...
