(Jamaica Observer) Hundreds of Jamaican college and university students who were banking on landing jobs in the US this summer to save for their tuition when school reopens in September have found themselves with neither the promised jobs nor the US$1,500 they each paid to secure placement.
Through local placement agencies, working with approved US sponsors, the students applied to the United States’ Summer Work and Travel programme, which allows post-secondary students from around the world to work at hotels, beach resorts, amusement parks, restaurants, or national parks across the US for three to four months.
For most of the agencies which recruited under the programme the process was smooth and their students are currently in the US. But for six of them, all of which were paired with the same US sponsor, their recruits have effectively been grounded.
It’s a crushing blow for the students, 400 in total.
Many of them borrowed the funds to register, in the hopes of recouping the money once they started working. Some resigned part-time jobs for the promise of increased earnings.
One young woman, who is a student of Excelsior Community College (EXED), told the Jamaica Observer that the fallout has left her broken in financial and emotional terms.
“It has impacted me in so many ways,” said the young woman, who asked that the newspaper withhold her name.
“I used to work with Sutherland part-time while going to school, and I resigned. I left my job in March with hopes of going on the ‘Work & Travel’. So all the money I saved went into paying for the programme. Now I’m not able to provide for myself financially. I’m broke; I have no money to spend. I’m very upset,” she said.
She says she now has no idea how she will pay for school — the tuition for which is over $200,000 for the year.
“I am applying for jobs at call centres and am just having faith and trusting God that something will work out. If not, I will have to take a leave of absence.
It would have been her first time on the work and travel programme.
“I’m really disappointed because I had even packed my suitcase,” the student said.
“I left my good-good job to apply for ‘Work & Travel’, only for it to all fall apart. I could have asked for a leave of absence from work instead.
Also reeling from the fallout is a third-year business student of Knox Community College, who also asked that her name not be used.
“I was going on the programme to earn my school fee and living expenses for the year,” she told the Observer.
She said she earned about US$8,000 on the programme last year and had her sights set on even more this year.
Like the others, she paid US$1,485 plus J$2,500 to register.
“I regret doing it because I could have saved that money. Or I could have used another agency, but I didn’t think to do that because I used them last year and didn’t have any problems,” the student said.
The issue, as labour relations consultant Earl Whyte of MV Placement and Management Services Ltd explained to the Observer, is that the sponsor with whom he says several of the agencies affected have worked for the past five years had been hospitalised for an extended period and was unable to submit required documents to the State Department as per the established deadlines. He said a temporary hold was therefore placed on the firm’s contract with the State Department.
“This caused a serious delay in the dispatch to the companies in Jamaica, a document (DS2019), which would allow the students to go to the US Embassy here to obtain the relevant visas to go to the US to participate in the Work and Travel Programme,” Whyte said, speaking on behalf of the six agencies impacted.
He said the agencies have made representation to Jamaica’s Ministry of Labour, the Jamaica Central Labour Organisation in Washington, the US Embassy in Kingston, and the US State Department in efforts to recover the sums.
“The six agencies paid in a total US$270,000 to a sponsor in the USA for 400 students to participate in the programme,” he disclosed.
The consultant said that on the grounds that the sums paid by the Jamaican agencies were remitted in time and in accordance with the rules and regulations governing the programme, he expects to recover the sums paid to the sponsor so that the students who have not gone to the US can be reimbursed as soon as possible.
It’s not just a matter of dollars and cents for Whyte and his fellow agencies, as they say their reputations are also at stake.
Still, some students who previously secured placement under their advisement remain hopeful that all is not lost.
Management studies student at The University of the West Indies Allesha Beckford is one of them. She was to begin her stint at a KFC in North Dakota on May 2. Based on her experience last year, she was expecting to net more than US$10,000 which she planned to use to prepare for graduation and entry into the formal work world.
“I wouldn’t call it a loss because I know that we will get it back. It just has to go through the process,” she told the Observer. “I know whatever happened wasn’t his fault.”
Like Beckford, final year EXED student Shaneika Ellis was looking forward to covering graduation expenses. She, too, does not blame Whyte for the disappointment, but is eagerly awaiting the resolution of the matter.
