Central Los Angeles : Union Rescue Mission’s Learning Center Debuts

Sporting a suit and tie, Larry G. Williams stood before an attentive crowd. Homeless just five months ago, he told the story of his downward spiral, from family life to drug addiction and the streets.

“I thought I was lost for the rest of my life,” Williams, 45, said after his speech during the dedication this week of a $300,000 learning center at the Union Rescue Mission in Downtown Los Angeles. But Williams, a member of the mission’s yearlong residency program, found a purpose through the high-tech learning center, which allows men to improve their reading and writing skills, finish their high school diploma requirements and become computer literate. Williams is the center’s first graduate.

“There was something about the challenge of doing something with my life,” said Williams of the center, funded by Bank of America and the Whittier Family Foundation.

Equipped with 32 computer terminals, five video-phonics machines, two CD-ROM work stations and a reference library, the center’s curriculum is designed to teach the men skills to get a job.

“We are training them to take an entry-level office job, to take them out of minimum wage jobs and give them a future,” said Christopher Gambol, the center’s director.

Gambol said the men’s skills vary. Some are illiterate, while others are college-educated.

Regardless of their backgrounds, Gambol said, after spending time at the learning center, “their self-esteem goes way up.”