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Lamont Hall: Leading Students Towards Success

Lamont Hall is the Career Preparation Supervisor at Sierra Nevada Job Corps in Reno, Nevada.

He knows the program works long after the students graduate and walk away with certifications.

“Were not just getting them into Job Corps and teaching them how to do something and sending them out there to do it.”

Lamont Hall with students
Lamont Hall with students

Lamont says, “We’re going to teach them, most importantly, employability skills and social skills to help them maintain a job as well.”

Job Corps offers great academic and vocational training. But we asked Lamont if that was enough? “If you don’t have the employability skills or the soft trade skills to maintain jobs, then you’ll get jobs, but it’s maintaining that job which is important.”

But Lamont tells his students that it does take work. “When you guys start working you will run into some difficulties sometimes. And that’s just a part of life. Life is not smooth all the time.

And fortunately for these students, Job Corps staff are behind these young people 100 percent of the time. Kayla Ybaria arrived as a new student at the center yesterday. “They made me feel welcomed. Mr. Hall made me feel so welcomed, and he told me I would make it and to just keep trying.”

Mr.  Hall says he believes in these young people. “It’s not just for the job but really it’s about what the individual can do it for the rest of their lives. So, I like to think of myself as a coach and I’m coaching these people to be successful. So, it’s a great place to work. I love it. I wouldn’t work anyplace else.”

“People have started off at Job Corps, this Job Corps center in fact, and now work in the corporate office. So, the upper mobility is fantastic, so there is nothing you can’t do. And they have a lot of training here as well. If you want to get trained, then you can get trained and then you move up.”

Lamont Hall - Sierra NV JC
Lamont Hall – Sierra NV JC