In the last six months, Health Action Overseas Romania Foundation (HAO) has continued the series of meetings between young adults with disabilities looking for a job and potential employers.
Thus, at the end of March, at the headquarters of the Constanta Services Center for Supported Employment, 7 young adults with disabilities aged 15 to 29 benefited from the opportunity to talk with the representative of PINOS TRADE 2001 SRL, a local firm that operates a chain of stores and a warehouse.
The meeting was organized as a group interview, in order to develop to the young adults the skills necessary to go through the stages preceding the employment. In the first part of the event, the representative of PINOS TRADE 2001 SRL made a presentation of the company and its perspectives, emphasizing the interest for hiring three commercial workers, in the dairy, and sausage departments and, respectively, at the cash register. In this context, he talked about the skills needed and about the tasks of each job and pointed out that his company hasalready hired two young adults with disabilities, through the LEAD project.
In the second part of the event, the young adults presented their CV, talked about what they know to do, what they like to do, about the motivation to find and keep a job, and asked the employer questions regarding: its expectations, the chances of advancement, the possibilities of having a program adapted to their needs (some of the young adults continue their studies).
This meeting proved to be extremely useful for the young participants. Since then, all of them have hired, with the help of the HAO team.
The young adults with disabilities have to discover their abilities and interests, and to carry out activities which they like. Starting from this point of view, the team of the Constanta Services Center for Supported Employment organized, in the second part of May and July, two experience exchanges at the SC Elion Import Export (ice cream producer) and the Pizza San Marco.
16 young adults who learn at the School Center for Inclusive Education ”Albatros”, enrolled in the program developed within the LEAD project, were participated at this events. During these two sessions, the representatives of the mentioned companies presented to the young adults the spaces of production, explained the manufacturing process, and talked about: the technological flow, the tasks that the employees have at different workplaces, and about the opportunities of the employment during the summer.
The visit was an excellent opportunity for young adults to understand the complexity of the activities, and for the HAO specialists to observe the interest of the young adults and the desire to get involved in such work. Following these events, some of the young adults were hired during the summer.
During the three years in which the LEAD project is carried out, 27 such experience exchanges will take place, 12 of them coordinated by HAO (Romania), 9 by Valakupiai Rehabilitation Center (Lithuania) and 6 by Consultis – Business Consulting, Unipessoal Lda. (Portugal).
