Learn about how UMB’s departments and offices can offer these types of opportunities to the young people of Baltimore through the summer program in the latest issue of “CATALYST” magazine.
Photo: Micah Murphy with Camille Givens-Patterson (left), Emily Runser, and Kim Mathis. Photo by Matthew D’Agostino
Seven years after he started at the University of Maryland, Baltimore (UMB) as a YouthWorks employee, Micah Murphy isn’t sure he would have completed college if he hadn’t participated in the program, let alone now be employed as a web developer in the UMB Office of Communications and Public Affairs (OCPA) and attending graduate school.
Murphy was a 16-year-old student at a Baltimore high school when he applied for YouthWorks, a program in the Mayor’s Office of Employment Development’s (MOED) Youth Services Division that was established 50 years ago and provides a five-week job opportunity during the summer to thousands of Baltimore’s young people ages 14 to 21. Its mission is to collaborate with participants and employers to create a meaningful paid employment opportunity that enhances youths’ job skills.
UMB offices and departments have the opportunity each year to hire students during the summer. Murphy was placed with the UMB Police Department his first year, working as an office assistant with duties that included installing a keylock system.
“It was really a great opportunity,” said Murphy, who returned for a second summer at UMB to work for Human Resource Services (HRS), which changed the trajectory of his career.
Murphy reported to Emily Runser, MS, human capital management functional lead for compensation, and she noticed he was a hard worker as he helped HRS digitize job descriptions.
“HRS had a need to add 500-plus documents to the website, and he gladly attended website training and added these documents to the website during his weeks of YouthWorks,” Runser said. “He was determined to complete the task while he was here and provided the HRS team feedback on how to do this better and maintain the documents. This showed me that he had developed the skills that any employer would appreciate. Micah’s accountability and commitment allowed HRS to achieve its goal.”
These attributes led Runser to recommend Murphy for a part-time contractual position as a web developer in OCPA during a chance encounter with a colleague in an elevator who told her about an opening. Murphy’s YouthWorks job was ending, and he was about to begin his first year of college at the University of Baltimore, where he initially thought he would study accounting.
“I had no prior web development experience, but since they knew I was a hard worker, they were willing to let me come in and train me, and now I’m here as an actual web developer,” said Murphy, who changed his major to marketing and is pursuing a master’s degree in management and marketing. He added that if he hadn’t been able to work at UMB, which provided him flexibility while attending classes, he may have been forced to drop out and find a full-time job instead.
Read more about Murphy and his experience with YouthWorks in the latest issue of CATALYST magazine.
You can read the Fall 2023 issue of CATALYST magazine, which highlights UMB's Center for Violence Prevention and its executive director; the University's three new deans; UMB's many innovations such as the School of Pharmacy training students to administer long-acting injectables; community initiatives such as the Community Engagement Center's workforce programs; UMB’s sustainability efforts to install a weather station; and much, much more!