Boston Teens Earn nearly $10M over 10 Years through John Hancock's MLK Summer Scholars Program

BOSTON, Jan. 12, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- Coinciding with the weekend honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.'s inspiring legacy, John Hancock is awarding $1 million in grants through its MLK Summer Scholars program to support 64 non-profit partners this summer. This year, 2017, marks the tenth consecutive year of the program, which has funded over six thousand jobs for Boston teens since its inception in 2008.

MLK Summer Scholars is believed to be the largest, most comprehensive, corporate-based summer jobs program of its kind in the nation. John Hancock oversees the program and works in close partnership with The City of Boston, The Boston Globe, Boston University, and Partners HealthCare, with additional recent support from The Ad Club of Boston. John Hancock also counts on EverFi, Boston Cares, and The Center for Teen Empowerment to help develop and implement its summer programming.

"The John Hancock MLK Summer Scholars program continues to be a model for the country in providing meaningful summer employment for young people," Mayor Martin J. Walsh said. "The impact of the program goes well beyond the money earned by students -- it equips them with financial literacy and independence, offers valuable work experience and empowers them to take charge of their future." 

For the anniversary, John Hancock created a video celebrating Dr. King's legacy as well as the program partners, non-profit partners and participants over the past 10 years.

Through the annual million-dollar program, Boston high school students spend the summer working at non-profit agencies across the city, gaining valuable real-work skills and engaging on issues that affect their community. Throughout the summer, all 625 Scholars also participate in unique leadership development workshops at Boston University, titled Mayor Menino Leadership Forums. Non-profits receive funding for each Scholar position awarded to provide 7 weeks of paid summer employment to Boston teens. This year, John Hancock increased the grants to $1,825 from $1,750 per Scholar to reflect the minimum wage increase of $11 per hour.  Sixty-four local non-profits, addressing a myriad of important community issues, were selected to participate in 2017. (See below for full list.)

"This is an important milestone year for John Hancock and its partners as it marks a decade of creating meaningful work opportunities, and leadership development programming, for Boston teens," said Thomas Crohan, assistant vice president and counsel, John Hancock Government Relations & Corporate Responsibility. "We are proud to continue to empower young people to develop important career readiness and financial literacy skills – all while becoming more active, engaged citizens through their work at high impact non-profit organizations." 

"We are excited to host MLK Summer Scholars once again, and to celebrate the tenth year anniversary of the start of this program," said Robert Scannell, Jr., president and chief executive officer, Boys and Girls Clubs of Dorchester. The Boys and Girls Clubs of Dorchester will be a non-profit partner of the MLK Summer Scholars program for the tenth consecutive summer this year. "Our MLK Scholars have leadership roles at our Club, since they are more familiar with the Club's operations. Being a MLK Summer Scholar is a badge of honor among our young people."

For more information regarding John Hancock's MLK Summer Scholars Program, visit www.mlksummerscholars.com

Non-profit organizations receiving MLK Summer Scholars grants for 2017 are:

About John Hancock Financial and Manulife 

John Hancock Financial is a division of Manulife Financial Corporation, a leading international financial services group that helps people achieve their dreams and aspirations by putting customers' needs first and providing the right advice and solutions. We operate as John Hancock in the United States and Manulife elsewhere.  We provide financial advice, insurance, as well as wealth and asset management solutions for individuals, groups and institutions.  At the end of 2015, we had approximately 34,000 employees, 63,000 agents, and thousands of distribution partners, serving 20 million customers.  At the end of September 2016, we had $966 billion (US$736 billion) in assets under management and administration, and in the previous 12 months we made more than $24.4 billion in benefits, interest and other payments to our customers.  Our principal operations are in Asia, Canada and the United States where we have served customers for more than 100 years.  With our global headquarters in Toronto, Canada, we trade as 'MFC' on the Toronto, New York, and the Philippine stock exchanges and under '945' in Hong Kong.  Follow Manulife on Twitter @ManulifeNews or visit www.manulife.com or www.johnhancock.com.

The John Hancock unit, through its insurance companies, comprises one of the largest life insurers in the United States. John Hancock offers and administers a broad range of financial products, including life insurance, annuities, investments,  401(k) plans, long-term care insurance, college savings, and other forms of business insurance. Additional information about John Hancock may be found at johnhancock.com.

SOURCE John Hancock Financial