It takes a community to help a child with special need to be inclusive

"It takes a community to help a child with special need to be inclusive."

Foreword Coffee started by two young NUS graduates who are so passionate about getting employment for people with special needs. I had an opportunity to meet these two social entrepreneurs as my client is their employee. My client has autism and I am assisting my client to transit better in his workplace. 

As employers , they understood their employers and work closely with their caregivers. Using social media as a platform of communication, their employees and family members  receive updates via Instagram and Facebook. They tried to match their employee's ability to the work scope and they made accommodations at their workplace for their employees to help them do their work well. For example, they made visual cue instructions cards for my client to pour the milk accurately in the coffee. As my client's manager has hearing impairment, my client also needs to use visual cue cards to communicate what he needs. Presently, they have 3 outlets in Singapore , helping at least 15 people with special needs (hearing impaired, cerebral palsy and autism) employed. 

Helping students with special needs requires a lot of help in transiting into the workforce. When most of them graduated from special school, they have "work culture" shock when they realise work life is not about doing your work well, one also need to learn soft skills such as greeting customers, working well with colleagues, managing break time, punctuality.

Special schools and volunteers welfare organisations (VWOs) as well as employers work closely with SG Enable to support students with special education needs through internships and mentoring programmes. Once a student graduated from special school, SG Enable will assign a job coach assist and support a graduated client with work related skills at their work place as part of School to Work (S2W) internship program for a year.

While I as a psychologist at AWWA, I provide psychological support for the clients who are employed under School to Work programme (S2W). I usually work closely with employers, job coach as well as client's caregivers to assist my client transit well to their workplace. Hopefully, they will be independent and happily working at their workplace as long as they are able to.