'Proud of my job': Program offers job experience to Okaloosa students with disabilities
Six Okaloosa County students are spending the school year working a variety of jobs at the Hilton Garden Inn on Okaloosa Island as part of a new program to provide real-world job experience to students with disabilities.
Project SEARCH is a national program, developed at the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, that was introduced this year in the Okaloosa County School District. The internship program is designed for job seekers with intellectual and developmental disabilities whose goal is finding competitive employment.
"These students are coming from all around our county to do this," said Kathy Ard, director of Exceptional Student Education with the school district.
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Ard said there are about 6,000 ESE students in Okaloosa schools with disabilities that can range from a speech impediment to autism or emotional behaviors that make it challenging to learn.
The six students in this year's program came from Silver Sands and Laurel Hill schools as well Crestview and Fort Walton Beach high schools. They have all completed their requirements for graduation, but have deferred receiving their diploma for a year in order to participate in the Project Search program. The program consists of three 10-week-long internships at the Hilton Garden Inn, that basically follow the school calendar year. Interns can choose from three separate departments at the hotel: maintenance, housekeeping and the restaurant.
"They actually apply for each internship that they want," said program instructor Beverly Wilson, with the school district. "They have an interview just like a regular job. They build their resumes and they learn workplace employment skills."
Students learn to translate experience into marketable skills
Wilson said the interns work five days a week, arriving in the morning by bus, and spend about five hours per day at the hotel. In addition to Wilson, the interns also have a job skills instructor from the Pensacola-based Global Connections to Employment. The instructor provides onsite support and teaches the students how to translate the experience into marketable skills.
"Our team is responsible for getting them hired and placed into competitive employment, whether that be here (at the hotel) or in the community," said Lisa Bloodworth, director of transition and support services with GCE. "Our success rate for placement is on average about 80% and, even better than that, is that 100% of them retain their employment."
For Silver Sands senior Marissa Page, the program has been a learning experience. One of the skills she has learned while working in the hotel's restaurant is how to make eye contact, something she struggled with before the internship. She said she was a little nervous about the job before she started, but it has given her a sense of confidence and that she's "proud of my job and proud of my friends."
That's welcome news for Rhiannon Reynolds, general manager of the Hilton Garden Inn. In the peak summer season, Reynolds oversees as many as 150 employees and said she's impressed with what she has seen.
"They show up enthusiastic most every day, they're happy to be here and they're happy to be learning job skills," Reynolds said. "We've had a lot of successes, and there have been a few learning moments for all of us. But that's part of it, and we're teaching them how to navigate, not just a job, but also the problems that come with a workplace."
And Reynolds is a big believer in the power of those job skills.
"My cousin Rich has Down's syndrome," Reynolds said. "When he was born they told my aunt and uncle that he would never accomplish anything; that they would be lucky if he could even speak.
"My uncle refused to accept that and found a local school in St. Louis that would teach him everything he needed to know. He graduated and has worked at the same McDonald's location in St. Petersburg for 26 years. He is a part of that community. The people in his local Publix know him, the people in his bank know him. He loves having that job, and having that independence. How amazing is that?"
This article originally appeared on Northwest Florida Daily News: Okaloosa students with disabilities learn job skills at Project SEARCH
