Program helps local disabled students

DAVE MOSIER/independent editor

An innovative partnership between several entities is enabling some disabled young people to get a taste of what life is like on a job site.

The Bridges to Transition program provides summer employment for young people ages 14-22 that have disabilities. Here in Van Wert County, job coaches from Capabilities Inc. in St. Marys help program participants gain skills for employment, explore possible careers, develop work skills and assist them in the transition from school to work.

The local program is supported through a partnership between the Ohio Rehabilitation Services Commission, the Ohio Association of County Boards and the Van Wert County Board of Developmental Disabilities.

The goal of the program, according to Chris Feichter of the Rehabilitation Services Commission, is to enhance career exploration options and increase employment outcomes by developing a collaborative network of services that will assist students in achieving their employment goals.

In Van Wert County, the Bridges to Transition program is exploring a different job site each week for six weeks. Participants work four hours a day at each site, with assistance from job coaches. An educational component is included at the beginning and the end of each daily session to discuss topics such as how to fill out applications, where to look for jobs, the types of jobs available, how to match their abilities to possible jobs and how to refine their interest in various types of work.

Job locations this summer include the YWCA, Van Wert County Fairgrounds, Big Lots, the YMCA’s Camp Clay, the Van Wert Solid Waste Management District’s Recycling Center and Trinity Friends Church.

This past week, the young people took on a number of duties at the Recycling Center, with the biggest being the repainting of a rusted recycling trailer. George Brake, SWMD coordinator, said he was pleased with the work the youngsters put in on the trailer project.

“They’ve done a great job,” Brake said, adding that the repainted trailer is a big improvement over how it looked before. “It was hard work — wire brushes, sandpaper, scrapers and all that.”

The SWMD coordinator added that program participants also helped with cleanup duties and customer assistance at the recycling center, while one participant also worked on the sort line where various classes of recyclables are sorted.

Brake said he felt the young program participants had a good learning experience while at the recycling center. “It’s a different skillset from what they’re used to,” he said, adding that he and his regular employees also learned some things, since this is the first time the center has repainted one of its older recycling trailers.

Next week, program participants will travel to two new sites, working at Camp Clay in the morning and at Trinity Friends Church in the afternoon.

In addition to the summer work sites, the Bridges Job Club meets once a month at local businesses durig the school year to explore job options. Each month, a new location is chosen to meet the interests and abilities of high school students involved.

This past school year, students visited Bob Evans Restaurant, Rural King, Goodwill, Pick ‘N’ Save, Wendy’s and Big Lots, where each business manager explained the different types of jobs available at their business, gave a tour of the facility and often had the students perform a task for a short period of time so they could put some of their skills to work.