Inclusive Employment For All Project

Getting a job or any means of livelihood in Nigeria and other African countries can be a very daunting task and it doesn’t seem to get any better. So imagine what that means for a young adult with intellectual and developmental disability in our country. In 2019, we at Eliakim Associates and Claudia's Threshold Foundation decided to change the narrative by taking the bulls by the horn and doing something great that encourages supportive employment services for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities in Nigeria.

Having provided inclusive education services for children with intellectual disabilities for the past twelve years, we were always faced with the “What Next?" question and we never had a compelling answer for parents until August 2019 when we decided that if we don’t do something about this, the population of adults with IDD will keep increasing and

Having provided inclusive education services for children with intellectual disabilities for the past twelve years, we were always faced with the “What Next?" question and we never had a compelling answer for parents until August 2019 when we decided that if we don’t do something about this, the population of adults with IDD will keep increasing and that will create a huge problem our communities. We know that no one will be able to cater for adults with IDD when their parents or guardians pass away and we also knew that was the biggest worry on the minds of their parents. So providing inclusive education is great but after secondary school, WHAT NEXT?

We created the supportive employment program tagged “Inclusive Employment For All" and it commenced in September 2019 with a total of eighteen 18 young adults with down syndrome and on the autism spectrum. We were honoured to have The Down Syndrome Foundation founded by a wonderful woman Mrs. Mordi believe in our program that she enrolled the adults at her centre in our program. They went through four months of soft skills training and entrepreneurial development to prepare them for business development and work life skills.

After the program, they had a graduation and were presented with certificates and it was quite an emotional and heart warming experience. The next phase of this one year program is the internship placement program and our joy knew no bound when we had Omolayo Gallery, Onikan Lagos give our young adult Christian, who has cerebral palsy an internship placement in his organisation. Christian passed the interview and tests which were part of the training they had. We also have other SME's who are willing to give our adults opportunities to work and learn in an inclusive workplace.

All our teenagers with intellectual and developmental disabilities are currently going through the transition program and inclusive vocational trainings. Our believe is that if they learn basic education in an inclusive school, they can also learn practical skills, get employment and be employed in an inclusive work space.

The few organisations (if there are any) who believe in the Inclusive employment program focus on individuals with physical challenges but no attention is given to those with intellectual and developmental disabilities and it’s time we change the narrative. We are all we have and the teenagers and adults we neglect today will become the ones who deal with us tomorrow.

Change the narrative today and send us an email on eliakimsessions4u@gmail.com to join us in changing the narrative. You can also send a DM on our social media platforms @eliakimtherapy

Inclusive Employment For All Training.. Cohort 1