Tiffany Paovella was running a restaurant in her hometown of Ossining, New York, when she realized that the ups and downs of the food service industry were becoming less palatable to her. As a mother of three teenagers, Paovella wanted a steadier career to provide for her family. She took a part-time job at the local library and decided to build on her associate’s degree to earn an online bachelor’s degree. Then she discovered Verizon Skill Forward while on social media. “I saw an ad that said, apply if you would like to learn about STEM courses that are available for free,” Paovella says. “And I was like, if it’s for free, it’s for me.” Paovella found that Skill Forward’s online courses easily fit into her busy schedule, and she was impressed by the variety of the offerings. She dove right in, determined to take advantage of the year of free, unlimited online classes that Skill Forward offers. “All these skills are useful and play into getting a job in this field,” she explains. “The more you have, the more beneficial. This is the future and where the demand is.” Verizon is committed to helping 50,000 individuals prepare for jobs of the future by 2030, offering technical and professional pathways to accelerate skill building for in-demand tech careers. The Verizon Skill Forward program offers tuition-free training to help people advance their careers and improve their economic mobility. Participants can access more than 250 courses spanning 84 unique professional certificate programs to pursue high growth jobs across the in-demand areas of AI, business, coding, communication, finance, IT and more. To sign up or learn more, visit Verizon Skill Forward.

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