The Career Gateway

Job Search Training Program for 50+ Professional Job Seekers

Are you over age 50 and frustrated by your job search?

JCA’s Career Gateway Program can help you hone your resume, polish your networking and interviewing skills, use Internet job search resources more effectively, and turn your age and experience to your advantage. Each session of The Career Gateway features 30 hours of small-group classroom instruction over five days, comprehensive take-home materials, practical exercises, and a long-term mentor – all for only $75! Sessions run from 9:00 a.m. until 4:00 p.m.

Tell us a bit about yourself and your availability.

Yes, I’m interested!

Career Gateway brochure

View Career Gateway Brochure 2024-2025

By enrolling in The Career Gateway, you will learn how to:

  • Turbo-charge your resume, using words and formats that grab employers’ attention
  • Hone your interviewing skills to make a dynamic first impression in-person, on Zoom™, or by telephone
  • Network effectively, using a “two-minute drill” to establish contacts locally and in cyberspace
  • Discover the hidden job market including the Internet and social networking
  • Develop a personal job-search plan, providing structure and organization to your job-hunting
  • Enhance your social networking skills

The course also includes:

  • An overview of today’s job market, with particular attention to challenges facing experienced workers
  • Ways to handle gaps in your work experience and address age or compensation issues
  • Easy-to-use forms for planning and managing your job-search campaign
  • Techniques for sustaining job-search momentum in the face of rejection
  • Techniques for answering interview questions
  • Pointers for selecting and giving reference names to potential employers
  • Writing effective cover letters, follow-up letters, thank-you notes, and other materials
  • Tips for responding to job advertisements
  • Techniques for contacting recruiters
  • Pointers for negotiation of job offers and choosing among multiple offers

We have had great success conducting these sessions as an interactive, Zoom, online experience.  The format for future sessions may continue to be offered virtually or may be offered in person.  Check, when registering, whether the session will be held virtually or in person at our JCA facility, 12320 Parklawn Drive, Rockville, MD.

The virtual sessions offer the same curriculum, class facilitator, presenters, and volunteers addressing all of the important job-seeking skills as in our in-class programming AND all from the comfort and safety of your own home!  Prior online sessions have been a resounding success!  Don’t be intimidated by online instruction!  We’ll train you and will work through this together!

For information, call Jodie Rasch at 301-255-4215 or by email.

2024 Sessions

Session I: September 16, 18, 20, 23, and 25

Session II: October 28, 30, November 1, 4, and 6

2025 Sessions

Session III: January 13, 15, 17, 22, and 23

Session IV: February 24, 26, 28, March 3, and 5

Session V: April 7, 9, 11, 15, and 16

Session VI: June 9, 11, 13, 16, and 18

*Check whether your session will be in-person or virtual. Call 301-255-4215 or email.

Optional Employment-Related Tech Classes Available.

The Career Gateway offers intensive training, take-home materials, a long-term mentor, and individual attention for mid-level managers and other professionals who are seeking employment at age 50+.

Registration for this five-day workshop is just $75 thanks to generous funding from Montgomery County Aging and Disability Services, the Morris and Gwendolyn Cafritz Foundation, and Adventist HealthCare.

Daniel Mormak, Vice President of RPO Services at HuemanPro – partners with Adventist HealthCare. Dan is a supporter of JCA’s Virtual 50+ Employment Expos (Expo Employer) and JCA’s Career Gateway program. Adventist HealthCare has hired Expo Jobseekers! Adventist HealthCare is an age-friendly hiring organization.

Jan Abraham is a former Virtual 50+ Employment Expo participant (Jobseeker). She is also a Career Gateway Graduate. Jan went on to become an Expo employer. She is a supporter of the Virtual 50+ Employment Expos and the Career Gateway program. She is currently Business Services Consultant with WorkSource Montgomery -an Expo Employer.

Tell us a bit about yourself and your availability.

Yes, I’m interested!

Contact the Career Gateway!

For more information, contact us at career.gateway@accessjca.org

Phone: 301-255-4215 or 703-425-0999

Learn about the Virtual 50+ Employment Expos