Labor Director

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. Marta Mendía de González . Psychopedagogue
Atty
Lic. Marta L. Mendía/Director

The program began in 1993, with the following objectives: -

• Introduce youth with disabilities into the working world -
• Encourage the development of their abilities -
• Make the public aware that people with disabilities can contribute to the work force, completing tasks with efficiency and quality

In the first Congress about Down's syndrome organized by ASDRA in Buenos Aires, we were called to present our experience with the program that today we call Supported Employment, for people with mental disabilities.

We remember our emotions and pride when we were able to share our experiences with the panel, including T.O. Christopher Stefen Lynch from Ireland, who is, without doubt, one of the most acclaimed figures in Supported Employment on the international scale.

After we showed them our video about the programs at Fundacion DISCAR, Lynch stated the following: "What you all have just watched is an exact example of what the Supported Employment can do for people with Down's Syndrome.

The example is perfect but is not traditional; generally people with disabilities do not live in situations exemplified here, they don't like where they work, they are poorly paid or are in protected environments.

Supported Employment is heading towards our goal; it's a new approach, a new philosophy. It is a vision. Between the reality and the vision is where the tension arises. This tension involves professionals, organizations, educators, families and employers."

"The most advisable thing is to stop specifically watching the field of Supported Employment and instead watch what is happening in the work world in general. Stop thinking about training in special environments. The employers know what they want their employee's abilities to be.

We just need to work to help them" At the end of his statement, he presented us with the following question: "How many people with disabilities today have a job and a decent salary? When are we finally going to wake up? As you saw in the video, they need us to wake up; they are waiting to demonstrate their potential.

This doesn't have to do with charity; it has to do with rights. Supported Employment comes to help change this situation; it helps give them the place they deserve in society.

Social integration in the work place is here to stay" We were convinced of that, and that is why we have worked so hard since then to build and develop our cause. We define the integration program as "Supported Employment" and characterize it as the following:

1. Integrated work in standard businesses in the most similar conditions possible to the other workers without disabilities that hold comparable positions.

2. On site training in a manner that first, places the person in a position, then provides them with the necessary training to fulfil that position.

3. Remuneration from the moment they begin working

4. Support through work related life issues to help them retain their position and required performance

This model of labour integration is based on total integration, with salaries and benefits from the start, and flexible support through the work life. When people with disabilities join a business or company, the personnel should be flexible and certain members of the business should train and orient the new employee.

This will allow the business to form a generation of leaders with a greater consciousness of their potential. We currently know that people with disabilities have the potential necessary to incorporate themselves in the work force and have a desire to do so. Certain businesses have started to discover this potential.

However, many of the people with disabilities who can and want to work are unemployed. This is due to the fact that people with disabilities haven't had the appropriate access to education and professional training, help services are not available, legislation and public policies do not help incorporation to businesses and buildings and means of transport are not easily accessible for them.

The lack of information and knowledge about disabilities brings with it consequences. Employers consider people with disabilities unprepared for the work force which can be difficult to demonstrate on the contrary. In a meeting with experts from the field in Finland in May of 1990, the following plan was adopted: "The object of all nations is to establish a society for everyone by the year 2000 where people with disabilities will constitute a natural and integrated part of society.

To achieve this, it is necessary to recognize the obstacles of independent life and the full equality that does not lie in the functional differences of individuals, but in the existence of an environment that has not been designed to satisfy the needs of all citizens"… Our program intends to respond to this approach by asking businesses to become environments that can receive and satisfy the needs of people with mental disabilities. A Supported Employment program has 3 steps: The evaluation, the entrance, and the follow up, and each step works around three axes: the integrated youth, their family and the business.

1- Evaluation

1. Evaluation and Selection of the Position and the Candidate Coordinator: Lic. Noelia Maldonado

Assistants: Virginia García and Denise Shocrón

Objectives: -

Evaluate people with mental disabilities, candidates from the Supported Employment Program

-Orient the candidate and their family in activities that benefit their full development

-Evaluate the possible position

-Taking into account the position, strengths and weakness of the future employee and develop the work profile

-Re-evaluate the possible employees taking into account the specific position in which the person is integrated.

-Integrate the employee into the business Goals

achieved in 2006: -18 job positions in different businesses -50 people with disabilities were interviewed

First we get to know the pathology, ethiology, therapy and forecast, through a diagnosis that the professionals that assist the youth carry out (Doctor, Psychologist, Phonoaudiologist and others). In case that he attends an educational Institution we also request a report from them. With this material we carry out a first evaluation stage. Then we maintain an interview with the youth and another with the parents. The objectives are to know those people, their potentialities, as well as the characteristics of the family environment and the variables that will facilitate a favorable adaptation to this new reality. Finally we elaborate the fellow's profile that will be compared with the requirements of the job position. The philosophy of the company to which they are integrated coincides thoroughly with the groundworks that sustain the task in our Foundation: and this is to treat the human being as a whole, revaluing his possibilities and keeping in mind his limitations.

2. Department of work monitering

Coordinator: Lic. Vanesa Ferraro Assistent: Lic. Carolina Ruete and Maria Nobile

Principal objective:

Detect the strengths and weaknesses of the employee.

The former to develop the employee, the latter to improve their skills.

Detection is a necessary step to working with the youth, educating them and developing their skills, with the goal to show that everyone can fulfill a work role Method of work: To carry out the aforementioned objective, every 2 months we visit each of the businesses.

These visits consist of a meeting with the boss or supervisor of the worker where we discuss their performance. We also discuss resolutions to any possible problems that have arisen. Currently we have 8 supervisors who, for the said meetings, provide an evaluation plan that they complete after collecting the appropriate information from the interview.

In certain cases, it is necessary to increase the number of meetings to more than twice a month, and in those cases, we adjust our schedules accordingly. Activities during 2006 -In the first half of the year we held more than 200 meetings -At the mid-point of the year, and after an exhaustive examination of the information from the meetings, we were able to detect strengths and weaknesses, successes and required areas of support for each youth at the time.

This information was related to the area of Training and Education so that we could plan our workshops according to the needs of the participants.

3. Department of Promotion and Training for the Job
Coordinators: Lic. Valera Maturana and Lic. Clara Saenz Valiente

Education and Promotion of Supported Employment
From the experience obtained through the years in which we observed integrated work environments with people with mental disabilities, we can affirm that those involved needed more individualized attention than their companions. For this reason one of the final steps of the education and promotion project of Supported Employment is that the employees have different spaces where they can devote more time to training with the necessary tools and can improve those work behaviors.
In the course of the year, various meetings were planned, both group and individual:

Individual meetings:
We worked on specific cases using different activities where the themes were:
a) Improve areas where they have made mistakes, where there is prolixity and regarding the quality of finished work
b) Lack of interest and motivation
c) Steps it takes to complete tasks
d) Schedule management
e) Comprehension of orders
f) Acceptance of limitations
g) Respect for the socio-labor norms
h) Reinforcement and training in the different positions
i) Observations of the position
j) Comprehension of appropriate conduct

Group meetings
Workshops on training and reflection for the employees

Objective
Create different spaces where more training time can be offered with the tools necessary for the improvement of job guidelines
Modality
In group or individual meetings, across the different work fields

4. Family Department
After 14 years of work with the integration of people with mental disabilities, the need to include their families quickly became an important subject. For this reason, we created the Family Department in 2003, for the families as well as the participants, promoting conversation, meetings, and the sharing of information.
General Objectives:
a) Create a meeting and dialogue space where an alliance is formed among the family
b) Work in an integrated family and team space to optimize the performance of the integrated person
c) Offer a space that encourages dialogue between the families and the Supported Employment program
d) Ask that the families share and analyze all of the changes demonstrated by their children through the work integration program, both in the family dynamic and in any future projects
e) Work with themes related to family, youth, work and adult life

Specific Objectives
a) Provide the conceptual tools regarding the themes to be dealt with during the year 2007
b) Ask that the families commit to Supported Employment, and with the integration of their children
c) Promote a positive change of attitude towards independence and their future growth

For the year 2007, we propose the following items:
-Achieve more attendance and participation from the families
-Continue with the work achieved in 2006
-Establish a more systematic communication style within the follow-up and promotion areas
-Ask that the families write reports about the experiences of their children in the work integration program

Goals achieved:
During these past years we have been meeting with the parents of the participants, discussing themes such as: dependence and partial independence, work integration, personal and familial demands, and life projects. We have also begun to hold meetings with siblings of the participants regarding their future together with integrated work spaces for individuals with disabilities.
We have held many conferences in the National Commission for Disabilities auditorium, with a large audience of parents and professionals, including Doctor in Psychology Claudio Garcia Pintos, who titled his exposition "Children Grow". In this exposition, he could reflect about what growth for people with disabilities implies, what their passage into adult life is like and what are the possible repercussions. At the same time, we held a legal assessment conference for the families about new laws, and the changes and benefits related.
Also occurring in the foundation during these years were the group interviews with the parents, brothers and sisters of the integrated youth. We used projections and videos as tools to relay the information we found most pertinent to the foundation. We tackled themes that the families proposed, for example: sexuality, independent life, reading and writing, etc. We hoped to establish a positive dialogue between the families and the group work they were doing, the exchange of experiences and opinions, and other related topics, with the goal to achieve a certain change so that the participants could reach their maximum potential from their work experience.

We have observed the following throughout the past few years:
An evolution of space in the Family Department
Personal growth of the familial groups and integrated youth
Perspective changes towards disability and possibilities for the future
Changes regarding themes and interests posed by the families
An increase in the percentage of familial attendance at meetings
Higher interest and participation in the process of labor integration
Positive changed in the links between siblings

For the upcoming work year, we are thinking about working on the following themes:
The concept of disability, Supported Employment and supports
The place of the family in the work life of the participant
Work, independence and adult life
Themes that emerge from integration and the changes that the youth produces, in the family and in society
Conferences and expositions with invited professionals

Our intention is to be able to continue working in a climate of trust and respect, holding meetings that benefit everyone. The Family Department has its doors open to receive phone calls, interviews and consults, not only for parents, but for siblings, extended family and professionals that work with the youth.

Our Staff:
Coordinator: Lic. in psycho pedagogy Natalia Serna
Assistants: Josefina Moro

IIt is our desire that the rest of the society valorizes people beyond their disabilities, being able to achieve in the near future a real labor and social integration, since the work dignifies the human being and it allows these youths to grow in fullness.

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