The Protection Division at this time signed up a further 70 authorities organizations, nonprofits and personal sector corporations to take part in its Army Partner Employment Partnership program. With the brand new additions, there at the moment are more than 600 such organizations dedicated to recruiting, hiring, selling and retaining navy spouses.
Gilbert R. Cisneros Jr., the undersecretary of protection for personnel and readiness, welcomed the brand new corporations into the partnership throughout an induction ceremony on the three-day MSEP Have interaction 2022 occasion in Northern Virginia.
“I need to welcome and congratulate and thank the greater than 70 new employer companions who’ve joined the Army Partner Employment Partnership right here at this time,” Cisneros mentioned. “In the present day we’re celebrating your dedication and induction, and this marks the end result of a strong vetting course of, all of which clearly demonstrated that you simply, the category of 2023, are actually dedicated.”
For the reason that MSEP program started in 2011, this system’s partnering efforts have helped join greater than 250,000 navy spouses to employment alternatives throughout all trade sectors, Cisneros mentioned.
“You have joined an elite group that opens you to the navy partner neighborhood and the varied abilities and abilities that they provide,” he mentioned. “With these newest inductions we’re as much as greater than 600 whole MSEP companions since we began this program again in 2011.”
Moreover, greater than 40,000 navy spouses had been reported as employed by MSEP companions since final October, Cisneros mentioned.
“[That’s] our largest hiring degree ever,” Cisneros mentioned. “This can be a testomony to all of you, our enduring and new MSEP companions, and I can not wait to see these numbers in 2023.”
This week in the course of the annual MSEP Have interaction 2022 occasion, new and long-time MSEP companions meet for orientation classes the place they talk about how new companions can have interaction with the navy partner neighborhood. Through the second day of the occasion, companions have interaction in networking and breakout classes to deal with areas reminiscent of recruiting navy spouses, understanding the challenges that navy spouses face, and making corporations extra pleasant to navy spouses.
This 12 months’s occasion additionally options, for the primary time, a 3rd day the place MSEP companions will meet with navy spouses looking for employment.
Army households, like most civilian households, want each companions working in an effort to make ends meet. Due to the variety of strikes a household should endure over the course of a navy profession, it is usually a problem for a service member’s civilian associate to search out sustained, significant employment, mentioned Patricia M. Barron, the deputy assistant secretary of protection for navy neighborhood and household coverage.
“Our unemployment charge type of hovers round 21%, which is much above the civilian charge, as lots of you realize.”
As a navy partner herself, Barron mentioned with every navy transfer she made, she needed to depend on her personal creativity and resilience, together with the generosity of these she discovered work with.
“I do owe my employers a lot due to their capacity to assist me and be versatile with my wants,” she mentioned. “Companions, please know you make spouses really feel very particular. You give them a way of aid, however extra importantly, you give them a way of self … I encourage you to go discover, get artistic, get to know the navy spouses that you simply rent, since you’ll be very, very glad that you simply did.”
Applications like MSEP assist the targets of Secretary of Protection Lloyd J. Austin III to higher assist taking good care of folks throughout the drive.
“Army spouses present the robust basis upon which their family members in uniform stand — and our communities and our nation depend on their resilience,” Austin wrote final month in a memorandum to the drive. “We owe them our energetic, unwavering assist.”
Subsequent week, greater than 30 new employer companions will turn into a part of a brand new initiative known as “MSEP Small Enterprise,” mentioned Eddy Mentzer, the affiliate director of navy neighborhood assist packages.
Mentzer additionally mentioned that in January, the division will put the primary navy partner fellows into the DOD’s new Army Partner Profession Accelerator Program.
“Army spouses can be positioned into 12-week fellowships the place they’ll acquire priceless abilities whereas being compensated with the aim of full-time employment on the finish of their expertise,” Mentzer mentioned.