The History of SER-Jobs For Progress, Inc. of Santa Fe, New Mexico
By Alex A. Martinez

On May 18, 1970, five members of the Santa Fe and LULAC Council #33, Frank Abeyta, Pat Ulibarri, Ross Roybal, Mariano Ortega and Raymond Chavez signed their names on the Articles of Incorporation of Santa Fe Jobs For Progress, Inc. (SER) and officially filed these documents with the State Corporation Commission. This practice officially gave rise to SER in Santa Fe and its effort to provide employment and training services to the Spanish Speaking People of the Southwest.

In August 1972, the SER Board submitted a proposal to the SER National Office and President, Ricardo Zazueta seeking funding to begin services to people in Santa Fe. The proposal was approved and provided SER with $150,000 of funding to hire staff and begin employment and training services to people in need of assistance. Roman Maes was hired as the first Executive Director of SER and SER doors officially opened to the public in January 1973, where they offered English as a Second Language, Adult Basic Education and On-the-Job Training services. Governor Bruce King supported the cause of SER and provided $50,000 of funding from the New Mexico Planning Office.

SER quickly established a reputation of success and a clear understanding of the dynamics of workforce development. In March 1973, they received funding to establish an automated data processing program in cooperation with the State of New Mexico. Twelve students participated in the training program offered by SER, all completed the training and were hired by the State of New Mexico. Other customized programs and funding followed with SER in partnership with the City of Santa Fe, State of New Mexico, State Highway Department, Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory and United Centrifugal Pump. SER clients were receiving quality training and were being placed into permanent, unsubsidized employment upon completion of their training.

In October 1975, SER National President, Ricardo Zazueta recognized Santa Fe Jobs For Progress, Inc. at the SER National Conference, for its innovativeness in designing programs to meet the needs of the local community. This award led to the Governor’s Office of Employment and Training Administration (GOETA) awarding SER a grant to develop a pilot On-the-Job Training (OJT) program for youth. This award was considered to be the first youth OJT initiative in the country.

The employment and training landscape continued to change nationally and in August 1978, SER’s Executive Director, Santiago Soto was asked to testify before Congress and the Committee on Education and Labor. Changes continued and the federal Job Training Partnership Act (JTPA) was passed by Congress and implemented in 1983. The JTPA had a dramatic effect in New Mexico, where a new Governor, Toney Anaya championed the elimination of duplication in State Government and created the New Mexico Department of Labor, thus integrating various workforce efforts into one department. This change eliminated the work of 80 workforce contractors in New Mexico, with only two surviving, SER in Santa Fe and SER in Las Cruces. SER’s survival was the result of a proven track record of success in employment and training and strong advocacy by the SER Board of Directors. With the new workforce landscape in New Mexico, all programs came under the direction and implementation of the New Mexico Department of Labor, except for On-the-Job Training Contracts with SER in Santa Fe and Las Cruces to serve clients in those respective areas.

In July 1985, SER was recognized at the USDOL Regional, “Let’s Pull Together Conference” as the Outstanding Rural On-The-Job Training provider. This award brought instant credibility to SER and opened the doors for its future programming which began when the New Mexico Balance of State Private Industry Council (PIC) set aside funds for new and innovative projects for youth. SER was able to utilize the 1986 Strategic Plan document, The Family Learning Center as a means of beginning a new directive for youth.

In 1988, SER initiated a partnership with the Santa Fe Public School District to pursue funding for a dropout prevention initiative entitled, Project Get Ahead. The initiative included the donation of a 10 station computer laboratory from the UNISYS Corporation and reading and math software from Autoskill, Inc. These partnerships resulted in a funding award of $50,000 in February 1989 by the PIC for Project Get Ahead. SER quickly hired professional staff, recruited students and implemented its model program. Four months later when the project funding was to end, the program success revealed that the 33 students that participated has improved their functional levels on the Test of Adult Basic Education by 7 percentile points in reading and 9 percentile points in math on the national curve. This success resulted in an award from the New Mexico State Job Training Coordinating Council of $435,000 to continue the development of Project Get Ahead and expand the program to other high dropout Districts in New Mexico.

At this same time, the New Mexico Economic and Tourism Department had completed a five-year strategic plan with five main goals. One goal was to increase economic development in New Mexico by reducing the States’ dropout rate. No program existed to address dropout rates except for the Project Get Ahead program. Staff of the Legislative Finance Committee met with SER representatives, reviewed the program design, then agreed to sponsor legislation that would provide $400,000 of funding to SER to implement the Project Get Ahead program in other school districts of New Mexico. With new funding from both federal and State sources, SER went about enhancing the program to serve both at-risk students and school dropouts with a program designed to meet their individual needs while helping the students to get a high school diploma.

In 1991, the State of New Mexico recognized Project Get Ahead as the JTPA Outstanding Youth Training Program in New Mexico. This recognition was shared with the USDOL Regional Office, who came to Santa Fe to meet with SER representatives to evaluate the program and determine if it should be submitted for national recognition. The SER Project Get Ahead program was subsequently recognized with the 1992 JTPA Presidential Award as the Outstanding Youth Training Program in America.

This award put SER on the national map and resulted in requests from various countries for assistance with educational programs they were working on. SER’s Education Coordinator visited Mexico City and worked with the Ministry of Education and teachers to implement similar program using the UNISYS and Autoskill technology. SER’s Education Coordinator was a keynote speaker at the Venezuela Teachers Conference, where she shared SER’s story and explained how we were able to help at-risk youth to graduate and pursue post-secondary training. SER hosted vistors from the Ministry of Education from South Africa who were touring five sites in the United States attempting to learn and implement similar programs their. Minister Julies cancelled his remaining three trips after visiting with SER and ultimately invested over 40 million dollars to education South African after apartheid. Many other countries visited SER and requested assistance with similar programs.,