John Hancock

John Hancock is a division of Manulife, a leading Canada-based financial services group with principal operations in Asia, Canada and the United States. The John Hancock unit, through its insurance companies, comprises one of the largest life insurers in the United States. John Hancock offers and administers a broad range of financial products and services, including life insurance, annuities, investments, 401(k) plans, long-term care insurance, college savings, and other forms of business insurance.

John Hancock’s MLK Summer Scholars addresses what is deemed a critical need in Boston – summer jobs for city youth. Working in close partnership with the Boston Globe, Boston University, Partners HealthCare, and the City of Boston, John Hancock invests over $1 million annually in this program, which offers meaningful work experience and personal development opportunities for participants. With more than 600 youth participating at almost 80 non-profit worksites each summer, MLK Summer Scholars is believed to be the largest corporate summer jobs programs of its kind in the country.

In addition to providing daily employment, MLK Summer Scholars brings together all 600+ youth of various backgrounds for bi-weekly job readiness and life skills workshops. With critical support from Teen Empowerment and Boston Cares, the workshops engage Scholars on topics ranging from financial literacy to civic engagement.

The main goals for our youth include improved work readiness including knowledge, skills, attitudes, and experience, increased earned income, and improved attitudes and perceptions about themselves and their families’ economic outlook. We also aim to raise funding for our Non-Profit Partners to help build and enhance their program capacity, and enrich their current programs and activities.

Our overall long term goals are to help positively shape a future generation of community & business leaders in Boston, and encourage Scholars to set goals for higher education and employment, plus decrease the summer unemployment rate for teens and ease the transition from school to the labor market

Through MLK Summer Scholars, we reach more than 600 Boston youth and 80 organizations a year. Our annual program evaluations reflect impact at the levels of behavioral and attitude changes for participants and capacity expansion for our non-profit partners. 2014 highlights include: 96% of our non-profit partners agreed that MLK Summer Scholars enriched their programming and 95% agreed that our program was consistent with their philosophy.

Scholars reported gaining skills and knowledge that built their confidence to succeed in the workplace and in school. 93% of scholars reported that that as a result of participating in the program, they are “better prepared to be successful in the workplace in the future..” 94% reported they now plan to work harder at school in order to get a good job in the future, and 91% of scholars reported that they are more comfortable working on projects with people from different backgrounds.