Getting work and being included
Aaron's story.
Lesley, Aaron's mum, has described what has happened for Aaron in the year after Aaron left school.Everyone said that Aaron would not be able to work. The employment support project said they could not help Aaron find a job, because he was not 'work ready'.
Even before Aaron was getting ready to leave school, we were thinking about how he could get a job. Other people did not see that for him, but we knew all the advantages for Aaron of being a part of his community, and work is one of the best ways of helping that to happen.
We got together as a family - me, his dad, big sister, wee brother and of course Aaron - and thought of all the things that Aaron likes. This was our list:
- roller coasters
- chips
- slush puppies
- lights
- swimming
- roundabouts or anything that twirls him round
- caravan holidays
- seaside - standing in waves
- music
- car and bus journeys
- sausages
- train rides
- amusement arcades
- car racing games
We also listed out all the things that Aaron is good at.
- Tidy - likes order
- Good at helping with cleaning and learning these skills at work experience
- Taking things to people
- He is getting better at talking to people, and loves the activity around a crowd.
We think the ideal job for Aaron would be:
Working at a holiday camp, cleaning caravans and enjoying all the activities on site when he is not working and enjoying sea side experiences, with support. He may need to live in a caravan to be near at hand."
We didn't expect that things would work out like that straightaway, but it gave us ideas.
The first step in getting started was to make sure that the day-to-day support Aaron had would encourage him to realise his potential. We met with several care providers, and settled on an organisation where the local manager understood how we felt and was interested in what Aaron wanted and what was right for him.
Aaron has two jobs now.
In one job, he collects glasses in a restaurant one evening a week. He collects from the tables and puts glasses in the washer and bottles in the bin.
At first he needed hand over hand support (when someone put their hands on Aaron's and did each step of each task with him). But now 9 months on he is doing it all with only someone to remind him what comes next if he gets a bit stuck, which doesn't happen often. He has done between 2 and 16 loads of glasses in the hour or two that he is at the restaurant.
This started out as unpaid work experience. It is still an unpaid 'learning how to do it' job, although he does now get crisps and juice. We are using it as work experience until Aaron is 18 when we think we can get him paid work doing it then.
The second job Aaron has is delivering the local free paper to 100 doors locally. It takes 4 of us to support him. I fold the papers and put leaflets in, Dad and Callum deliver the other 150 on his round and his support worker helps him put the paper in the door of his 100 houses, all for £7 a week.
Although he is not making much money, Aaron has proved lots of professional workers wrong by being work ready and very able.
Our plan is to get him other employment this year that pays more. We have a few ideas but his support staff have changed staff twice, so we are waiting for the new folk to settle in before proceeding.
Aaron has done lots of new things since leaving school and is getting known about the town. But we think that getting a job is really important as it will increase his chances of friendships.