Mat-Su Regional Offers Job Skill Opportunities for Developmentally Disabled

5/28/2020

The founder of the world-wide program known as Project SEARCH visited Mat-Su Regional Medical Center last month to present to staff the latest on the educational and professional advancement internship for people with developmental disabilities.

Mat-Su Regional was the first organization in the state to partner with Project SEARCH to develop a skills-based, immersion education program for disability-challenged young adults. The program is fully integrated in the hospital’s daily operations. Mat-Su launched its program in 2011 and currently has seven interns working various jobs throughout the hospital.

Upon witnessing the success of Mat-Su Regional’s program, four other hospitals in Alaska have followed in its steps to partner with Project SEARCH and implement a similarly modeled program.

Project SEARCH was original launched in 1996 at the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center and was designed to help train people with developmental disabilities for a workplace environment.

Since the mid-90s, 600 hospitals and other business around the world have become host workplaces for this learning environment.

“In the United States, there haven’t been that many programs that provide the training and preparation for people with disabilities to learn those skills. That’s what Project SEARCH is,” said founder of the program, Erin Riehle, RN, MSN.

Each internship lasts an entire school term of nine months, with participants working four to five hours a day. Students must have a developmental disability, ideally be between 18 and 21 years old and have a willingness and desire to learn and work in order to be accepted into the program.

Hospitals host the majority of the Project SEARCH interns due to the wide variety of jobs. There are also Project SEARCH programs at zoos, museums, air forces bases, insurance companies and industries across the world that serve as learning labs.

“People with developmental disabilities can do really hard things, as long as there is an element to it that is routine, and hospitals tend to be full of those types of jobs,” Riehle said.

Project SEARCH endeavors to teach students more than just job skills. The program also prepares participants socially in terms of personal space, hand shaking or elevator etiquette.

Riehle discussed how the program requires an inclusive environment for interns by requiring them to follow the same routine and rules as other staff members at their host business. She also detailed the importance of learning to live through unpleasant but common situations such as boredom.

“They’re not special, they’re not precious and quite frankly we must teach them how to work and how to be bored,” she said, noting that leniency does a disservice to people with developmental disabilities.

A combination of job and social skills training is critical, according to Riehle, because the ultimate goal after graduation is employment. Each area’s program must be strategic in providing marketable skills that can be used in open jobs within that community.

“If you’re going to train somebody, you have to train them for jobs that exist. Not just to train,” she said.

Two of Mat-Su Regional’s former interns now work at the hospital. Michelle Gerbin in Surgical Services was hired in 2013 and Moises Aragona has been working in Environmental Services since 2016.

In the past year, 80 percent of the Project SEARCH interns found jobs after graduating the program, but Riehle is looking to continually improve the experience for students.

“We need to do a better job making sure that we’re looking for good opportunities. We need to make sure we’re holding these kids to quality and productivity standards,” she said.

Currently the Project SEARCH is adding curriculum on health education and financial education in order to help interns become more independent once they step out into the world.

“We’re not looking to teach the easiest things. These kids have been there, done that. We’re taking opportunities to learn complex and systematic skills that increase their job readiness,” Riehle.

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