Throughout our weekly blogs, I have looked at a variety of different topics, and as we moved into the next year we will have guest blog’s each week written by those associated with TRACK. The last few weeks have been hectic, and with this week being half term it is quite a brief blog, as it is being written during a break in my Personal Licence holder qualification course, which means we will then be able to host a range of events at our new premises.
Half Term
Those of you that have followed the start-up of the business will know that I was a teacher for the past 10 years, and part of that has always been the school holidays. It dawned on me recently that this is the first time in my life that I didn’t have a 6 week summer holiday, and even more so that my last week off was back in July, but I think that is because at this moment in time I love working! I thoroughly enjoyed my time as a teacher but became increasingly frustrated on the national level focus which was purely around academic achievement, and not on the development of young people as a whole.
That is not to say there have been no sleepless nights, and much of the best advice I have received from people has been about RESILIENCE and the need to accept that challenges occur, and things will go wrong. As we move into our next chapter there will no doubt be more highs and lows, but the key thing (on a personal level) is to approach each of these with a positive mindset, which I find helps me a lot
Employer Visits
Through our mentoring we are now starting to visit a range of different workplaces and looking into the different opportunities which are available to gain experience. I must say a huge thank you to the Central Library in Northampton, and the new University of Northampton Waterside library who have both been fantastic in supporting our mentees to gain an idea of what a job involves. In future weeks we have another variety of placements and activities lined up to support people.
Environment
As I sit in this training course (which is very good and informative) approaching an assessment at the end of the day (It is a test but I don’t want to call it that, as I know it will make me more nervous), it reminds me of the importance of considering the layout and environment of activities, and this is something we will be looking to implement in our new premises which will inevitably grow across the forthcoming months.
We believe that with small changes the workplace can become so much more accessible to people who want to work. From my experience the majority of autistic people do not want charity, they want opportunity. Work with us to help a create spectrum of opportunities which will benefit all of those involved.