Coordinator Of Developmental Services

– Coordinator of Developmental Services

Our vision:

A community where individuals who have a mild intellectual disability are able to access and sustain employment options as an integral element of community inclusion.

This is an amazing opportunity to join a long standing not for profit social enterprise that continues to evolve and increase it's impact with the support of our wonderful community. Options has strong community ties and is located in the hub of vibrant Port Credit, Mississauga.

Options Mississauga Print & Office Services is a federally registered charity and social enterprise operating in Port Credit since 1993. Our mission is to provide innovative employment strategies to individuals who have an intellectual disability to support their employment goals

We offer four training programs for adults with an intellectual disAbility:

Our Retail Training Program uses the infrastructure of our retail printing and office services store to provide skills development related to retail employment, and provides a pool of potential candidates for internal employment in our organization.

Our Arts Training Program offers training by professional artists to individuals who are interested in developing a self-directed career as artists.

Our Culinary Training Program offers cooking and food handling training by a professional chef to individuals who are interested in seeking employment in the food services industry. About 2/3 of intellectually disabled adults in Canada who are employed have found jobs in this sector. Program graduates have opportunities for paid employment cooking meals for local events, outreach programs and churches.

Our Horticulture Training Program offers an opportunity for graduates to become employed at nurseries, garden centers, landscaping companies to name a few. We expect this new program to result in another social enterprise - providing fresh locally grown produce for our own Culinary program, local restaurants and caterers and outreach programs & food banks.

Job Specifications: This is a full time permanent position (35 hours per week) with working hours 9am to 4:30 pm .

Skills Requirements for the Position: Must have education and/or direct experience that can be utilized to effectively support the duties as defined below. Graduates of post-secondary educational programs in the social work area is highly desirable. Experience supporting developmentally disabled adults highly desired as is experience in setting up training plans and reporting effectively against plans to determine performance.

Evidence that the candidate has attributes conducive to success in the position – patience, empathy, awareness of the challenges facing the people we support (such as personal connections with intellectually disabled individuals in the community), verbal and written communication skills. A crucial aspect of the position is to be able to establish a positive working relationship with the different personalities of the people we support.

Core Job Functions:

1. Providing direct support as needed to the intellectually disabled participants in our retail employment training program. Each participant has an individualized plan for specific employment skills to be acquired. The coordinator sets up these plans initially and then tracks actual progress to the plans, including changing the plan content as required.
2. Providing direct support to participants as required in the instructor led Arts Training Program. The goal of this program is to develop the skills necessary to become professional artists. There is no individualized skills develop plan – all have the same goal.
3. Providing direct support to participants as required in the instructor led Culinary Training Program. The goal of this program is to develop skills necessary to obtain employment in the food services industry (cooking, food handling etc). There are no individualized training plans – all have the same goal.
4. Providing direct support to participants as required in the instructor led Horticulture Pre-Trades Program. The goal of this program is to develop skills necessary to obtain employment in nurseries, garden centres, landscaping, produce centres, or as a stepping stone to trade programs.
5. Set up and manage intake and ongoing scheduling of participant attendance directly with the parents or stakeholders of participants
6. Identifying and supporting participants in our training programs that are candidates for employment within Options by refining their skills development to fit available part time employment opportunities
7. Providing direct support to individuals in planning and executing any specific areas of skills development (eg IT skills that will be helpful in any employment (how to use internet search engines, effectively utilize their smart phones, utilize calendars and manage contact lists)

These functions should account for approximately 85% of the total hours spent in this position.

Other Functions Common to all programs

1. Provide support to individuals outside of our 4 core employment training programs. For example, directly supporting participants in a new Pilot - Effective Communication Training Program if direct support is ncessary.
2. Ensure there is the right infrastructure to make all training programs achieve their goals. For example, if a participant wants to take part in a coop opportunity in the community the arrangements will be facilitated to ensure the right direct support is provided to make this a part of their successful transition into employment.
3. Assist as required in the Supervision of coop students, temporary staff hired to achieve specific goals and volunteers who are taken on to assist the Coordinator in achieving the planned outcomes and performance goals.
4. Provide direct support to individuals in planning and executing any specific areas of skills development as required (eg specific IT skills that will be helpful in any employment - ie how to use internet search engines)

These functions should account for 5-10% of the workload of the Coordinator

Administration

1. Collect and provide ongoing reporting of outputs and outcomes of all training participants. Review results and make changes to established performance measures to improve the program contents and metrics for the effective assessment of program results compared to goals
2. Provide information to stakeholders as needed eg) keeping parents informed of progress if participants are amenable, providing input as required regarding the effectiveness of grant funding in meeting the goals of the grant.

These functions should account for 5-10% of the position workload