Confidence
Begins Here.
CWEE Stories
Celebrate CWEE’s 40th anniversary with a look at some of the extraordinary career seekers we have served.
Ms. Novella
In the 40 years since CWEE was founded, more than 16,000 career seekers have passed through our doors. Many of these alumni stay connected to CWEE long after they finish, periodically returning for career support or coaching.
Our participants report that there is just something special about being at CWEE, a powerful vibe that makes you feel supported, valued and capable.
That CWEE secret sauce is our people. It’s about how this team approaches our work, from a deeply compassionate and strengths-based perspective.
One key ingredient in CWEE’s secret sauce is Novella Leslie, who has been with the organization for 32 years.
Ms. Novella sees potential in others when they may not even see it themselves. Her steadfast belief in CWEE’s participants, and deep respect for the wisdom and skills that they already have, is what has made Ms. Novella an unforgettable teacher for so many.
“Most of us get through this world with the full support of a family, a spouse, good neighbors. A lot of our participants when they walk through our doors have no support. They have themselves and they have their children. I want them to know – and to feel – that CWEE is a place that they are going to get support.”
Ms. Novella’s own background and career path reflects the continuous learning that CWEE works to promote with our team and our career seekers.
A Denver native, Novella grew up in Park Hill and graduated from Manual High School. Novella and her husband Bill were young when they started their family, and Novella recounts with a wry smile that Bill was “old school” and didn’t want her to work once their child was born.
That didn’t last for long.
Novella convinced Bill to let her join her parents and work at the cleaners that they managed – just to save some money for Christmas. She ended up working at the laundry for more than 10 years. When her mom got sick at age 57, Novella left work and took care of her mom every day for the last year of her life.
“My mom passed away and suddenly my 24/7 job went away, and I didn’t know what to do with myself. I had taken some classes, and there was this new thing called word processing, it was all the thing back then. If you wanted a career you needed to be a word processor, it was what employers wanted.”
Novella found a training program and she learned the “ancient” software program from IBM called DisplayWrite to create documents on early PCs. She didn’t have technical skills and word processing wasn’t something many women pursued.
As usual, Novella was not deterred.
“You tell me I can’t do something you might as well open the door, Charlie, because I am going for it.”
Novella credits her determination to her mother’s example. “She was a woman of strength and courage, and you couldn’t tell her no. She only went to high school, but she was resourceful and really smart. The best thing she did for her kids was to teach us to not take no for an answer and never let anyone tell us that we can’t do something. That philosophy has followed me all my life.”
Novella got her teaching certificate in 1991, the year after she started working with CWEE. Ever since, she has been CWEE’s digital literacy instructor, a role that has allowed her to constantly evolve her skills as the world of technology transformed over the last 30 years.
With digital literacy a key focus of CWEE’s program, our participants spend a lot of time with Ms. Novella, and her coaching goes far beyond just computer skills.
“I believe your self-esteem comes from within but a lot of times our skills have to be pointed out to us. So many of our participants live in survival mode and they don’t realize the skills they have as a single parent and how resourceful they have to be to make ends meet,” said Novella.
Ms. Novella is relentlessly positive and encouraging. She excels at helping CWEE career seekers see the connections between what they can do and how they can use that to grow.
“I do that with a lot of praise for what they can already do. Praise to me is important, it is a gift of words to another person.”
At 74 years old, Novella shows no signs of slowing down. In fact, she retired in 2015, but it only lasted two months. Novella returned to CWEE first in a part-time role and then later full-time. Asked why stay with CWEE for so long when the norm is to switch jobs every two years, Novella doesn’t hesitate.
“I get to see the results of my work. I go in and do my job and five years later I hear from a participant that ‘Hey guess what, I bought a house’ or ‘I got a promotion’ or my absolute favorite, ‘My child graduated from college.’ I don’t think I could get that in another position,” Novella said.
“It’s never a job if you love what you do, and I am still loving it, and I am still looking forward to what CWEE looks like in the future.”