Featured Story: Forging Futures
Through Foster Success’s national reach, we help young people build pathways toward meaningful careers and long-term economic stability.
Our approach recognizes that education, employment, and financial stability are deeply connected. Whether pursuing a college degree, earning an industry-recognized credential, entering the skilled trades, or preparing for a first career, young people receive the coaching, resources, and connections they need to turn their goals into tangible opportunities.
Through programs like Works Wonders® and employer engagement initiatives, Foster Success equips young people with career coaching, credentialing, and industry connections, providing a clear, supportive path to promising jobs.
In Indiana, Foster Success continued expanding Workforce Readiness opportunities that support young people in discovering and pursuing meaningful employment. Willadeene’s experience reflects the intentional pathway we create so young people have the tools to build lasting careers.
Her interest in trades started early.
As a child, she remembers seeing photos of ironworkers perched high up and building skyscrapers. The challenge and skills needed behind the work fascinated her, but she was never sure how to break into the industry.
During Works Wonders®, Willadeene learned that the adaptability, problem-solving, and perseverance she’d developed throughout her life were strengths employers looked for. In Willadeene’s first coaching meetings with Sydney, Foster Success’s Workforce Coordinator, her childhood dream became a concrete career goal. Together, they mapped out her steps to get there.
Through the class, she connected with the Latinas Welding Guild, an Indiana – based nonprofit organization offering welding training and job placement for marginalized communities.
Dwyane, a Next Steps Coordinator with the Guild, spoke to the cohort about careers in the ironworks industry and Foster Success’s partnership with their MIG (Metal Inert Gas) Welding program. It was an opportunity that checked all of Willadeene’s boxes.
Across just seven days, she learned how to weld pieces together, operate hydraulic presses, and more. By the end of the week, she aced the final exam and received her first welding certification.
Her dedication and work ethic landed her a sponsorship to an advanced class at the Guild. Most recently, she became one of 30 apprentices accepted into the highly competitive Ironworkers Local 22 Apprenticeship Program. But it’s the small moments of recognition that gave Willadeene the motivation to continue.
Entering the foster care system at fourteen, navigating life often alone was difficult. As a single mother balancing a new career path, the consistent encouragement and celebration of her achievements from staff gave her the confidence to keep moving forward.
“They’re [Foster Success] very supportive of me and that’s a big thing. Sometimes I don’t have support like that much in my daily life. It made me feel pretty good,”
Willadeene shared on how being pushed in the right direction sparked her determination.
Today, Willadeene is working towards becoming a journeyman, with hopes to one day become a foreman. At her current job, she looks up and watches the ironworkers above. It’s a view that reminds her that her dream that was once afar is now within reach.