Mr. Arellano is thirty-two years old and lives in the East End community.  He found out about SER services through a friend who participated in Pathway funded training services.  He was laid off in May 2011 and has been receiving unemployment benefits.

Due to his background, he knew he would be facing a challenging job search.  Since he had some means of financial stability with unemployment benefits, he decided to equip himself with training tools that would help him increase his marketability.   He had some experience in construction and with nationally recognized certifications; he felt he had a better chance of finding a job with a competitive wage. 

Mr. Arellano enrolled in our Green Construction training on July 5, 2011 and completed training two weeks later.  With the assistance of our job development team, he started his job search.  On August 17, 2011, he began work for Zachary Construction as a Carpenter with a starting salary of $18.00/hr.  Mr. Arellano made a special trip to SER to give thanks for helping make his job search successful.  He lives with his mother and feels that he can now start helping her after she helped him through his period of unemployment.