The Voice - Gateway Association with Betty and Jasmine

Join  VAD as we talk with Betty and Jasmine about the programs that the Gateway Association offers the community.  Learn about family resources and employment resources that they offer.  

Transcript

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

Welcome to the voice of Albertans with Disabilities podcast for September 2023. I'm Teresa Makarewich, your host and VADs program and service manager. Thanks for joining today. In today's podcast, I'll be talking with Betty and Jasmine from Gateway Association. Gateway’s Employment Resource Center connects job seekers and workplaces with resources required to build performance and inclusion. The future of work will be diverse and inclusive. They can help. Their family Resource Center assists families supporting loved ones with disabilities to build their capacity, confidence, and connections. VAD has been speaking with VAD members to discover programs and services offered in the community. Together, we hold power. Hello folks and welcome to the podcast. Can you take a moment and introduce yourself?

Betty Hahn-Sidor, Gateway Assoc.

Sure. My name is Betty Hansor. I'm the manager of planning supports at the Family Resource Center for Edmonton and area.

Jasmine Hasiuk, Gateway Assoc.

And I'm Jasmine Haschak, and I'm the intake and mentorship coordinator for our employment program here at Gateway Association in Edmonton.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

Thank you for joining us today. I have a few questions about Gateway Association to gather information for our listeners. So to start with, we'll ask who is Gateway Association as an organization?

Betty Hahn-Sidor, Gateway Assoc.

So Gateway is an organization that is passionate about empowering families and people who live with disabilities to live fully authentic lives. We envision a community where all children grow within a family. All children learn together in neighborhood schools. All adults work at real jobs in the community. All adults have real homes and real friends. And all people are valued, contributing members of their communities. Gateway includes a family, Resource Center and Employment Resource Center that provides education, family support, mentorship, and inclusive employment. It's our mission to assist the community to understand disabilities Like to recognize that Gateway Association has offices in both Treaty 6 In a Amiskwaciwâskahikan and Treaty 7 in Mohkinstsis recognizing the land on which we live and work as a starting point in understanding and respecting the indigenous communities that have been here for centuries. Reconciliation to our organization Means prioritizing critical thinking about intersectionality and equity throughout All our work. Continuous unlearning of oppressive thoughts, ideas, beliefs, actions, listening to and believing indigenous peoples and their communities about their experiences, and making space for equity seeking groups of all kinds to determine what is best for them.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

Great. Can you give some history about your organization?

Betty Hahn-Sidor, Gateway Assoc.

Yeah. So in 1975, a group of passionate parents fought to open doors for their children. Gateway Association emerged as the gateway to a better life they envisioned for people with developmental disabilities and their families. Gateway Association was originally focused primarily on education and working toward inclusion in our public and Catholic schools. Gateway has grown and changed over the years and while working with younger families is still important to us, we are currently working more with youth, adults, and families, supporting people with making plans for their loved ones, providing resources and supporting job seekers to find meaningful employment. We have developed partnerships, expanded provincially, and look forward to sharing our many offerings with you today.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

Today we're talking about two different programs who can tell me about the Employment Resource Center.

Jasmine Hasiuk, Gateway Assoc.

That would be me. On our employment side and in our employment program We support individuals who experienced disabilities throughout their employment journey, with the end goal of finding and maintaining meaningful employment. That's a great thing. So, we work one-on-one with each person through a four-step process, and it can look a little bit different for everybody as each person kind of is maybe at a different stage in their employment journey. So, we kind of work with them individually to meet their own unique needs. We try to accommodate as best as possible throughout our whole process. So the four step process includes going through career exploration and self discovery where we support the individual to figure out what their employment goals are and the steps needed to reach them. We work with individuals through employment preparation, which can include things like. Resume development, cover letter development, navigating the online job searching platforms. Kind of all the pieces that get you prepared for employment so that you're really successful once you're employed. We then transition individuals into jobs and finding that opportunity. And this is where we support with actual job searching, job applications connecting with employers, interview prep, and when someone gets the job, we also can offer onboarding support. After that phase, participants move into our maintenance phase and maintenance is supporting the individual after they get the job to maintain that job for up to three months. Sometimes it can be a little bit longer. Sometimes people don't want support in the maintenance phase and everything kind of works for us.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

You work with children and adults. Is there a specific age or age range with adults that can access the Employment Resource Center?

Jasmine Hasiuk, Gateway Assoc.

Yeah. So, our funding can always change, but our current funding we can work with anybody that is 16 and older that lives with a disability or mental health based barrier to employment and that disability or mental health based barrier can be a formal diagnosis or it can also just be self identified. So, we don't require Any sort of paperwork or anything of that sort to be a part of our Program, our other criteria is also that you have to be legally able to work in Canada and either unemployed or underemployed.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

Family Resource Center. Can you please tell us about that?

Betty Hahn-Sidor, Gateway Assoc.

Sure. So, the Family Resource Center is a hub for individuals with disabilities and their families to get support with accessing and navigating disability services in Alberta, we were chosen to become the Family Resource Center for the Edmonton region in the spring of 2021. We want to build capacity, confidence, and Connections to ensure supports for all individual. We want to scaffold, navigate, support, and facilitate meaningful, inclusive, and empowered lives for the individuals we support with disabilities, along with their families. Therefore, we offer learning opportunities such as workshops, planning support such as individual support plans, system navigations such as steps and timelines, mentorship opportunities through our families. Forward meeting community building. So, beyond disability related resources and looking at wider community of inclusion.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

These sound like great resources. What are some of the projects these two programs have done in the community?

Betty Hahn-Sidor, Gateway Assoc.

So I can speak to the family Resource Center - every December, We host our community Holiday potluck to gather community staff and members to celebrate and show our appreciation of the gateway community. And in June, we host an outdoor family picnic for the families of Gateway.

Jasmine Hasiuk, Gateway Assoc.

We do a few events throughout the year as well. On the employment side, in collaboration with some of the other teams at Gateway as well. So in May, we host a mayor’s Luncheon and last, This year was  Our 10th annual mayor's luncheon and we, the Mayor's luncheon, brings together municipal government leaders from across Alberta As well as business and Employment inclusion, service providers and job seekers to engage, learn and explore collaborative strategies to fast track EDI and create inclusive workplace cultures that include Albertans with disabilities. As that's a big push for us on our employment team in October, which is coming up right away, we host a variety of events to support Deam, Disability Employment Awareness Month and this year we're hosting A few events. One called inclusion Works, another one called cheers to inclusion, and we're also hosting A2 day career 360 event, all geared towards celebrating inclusive employment.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

Can you share your thoughts on how Gateway contributes to the disability community to help better people's lives, especially with employment and family resources?

Betty Hahn-Sidor, Gateway Assoc.

Yeah, I can speak to the family Resource Center because we've been busy building partnerships and collaborations, especially within the last two years. One of the partnerships we have is with the Glenrose Rehabilitation Hospital where We get referrals for youth, for planning and supports. We're connected to the Edmonton Food Bank for Food Security and Volunteer Opportunities, Children's link for application help, getting ready for inclusion today, which is GRIT. We run workshops together for younger children. Another partnership is medically complex Friend fragility, inclusive support, parent working group. So that's bringing together parents that have medically fragile kids to hear about challenges in the inclusive education system. We also have a partnership with the regional Provincial Advisory Committee with where we share updates on the Family Resource Center, ways to recruit for our PAC's share stories and observations, and do some collaborative thinking. We're connected with autism Albertas Family Resource Center, where we share resources and workshop opportunities. The Metis nation of Alberta. We've done presentations on disability services in Alberta, multicultural health brokers where we work together with brokers, supporting families and job seekers. The Edmonton Public Library - We've done some registered disability savings plan presentations with them and the Africa Center - We're exploring mental health therapy for black folks and that's just A few of them.

Jasmine Hasiuk, Gateway Assoc.

We try to Do similar work on the employment side as well, so a big piece Of our work Is building partnerships and collaborations to kind of best support the Individuals that we get To work with. So, on the employment side, we’re part of a national initiative, the Canadian Association for supported Employment, as an initiative that we work under called Mentor ability. And we've been a part of that for the last four years. So that initiative we worked to facilitate unique short term mentoring opportunities between employers and people experiencing a disability as one of the hub coordinators here in Alberta, I get to make these connections and then create the space for the mentorships to take place. So that's been a really big part of our employment program so far and we continue to utilize that in the future. We're also part of a job developer group, which is a committee of service providers that share resources, support, job seekers among the community and work collaboratively rather than competitively, which can be of obviously of benefit in our field of work as we all have outcomes, But when we're working collaboratively, it's significantly more successful then competitively.   a new branch of gateway that was initiated in February of 2022 is our Jedi Hub. So Gateway to equity diversity and inclusion and they are Alberta's first and only free workplace, EDI Resource Center, they are kind of a  One stop shop In helping workplaces build their EDI capacity and knowledge, they've been really great in supporting employers on their inclusion, inclusion, journey. And so, it's been beneficial for the participants we support as well as more employers are building their knowledge and capacity, which has been helpful. Another branch of gateway is our digital inclusion Club and this focuses on supporting people to gain the Basic digital skills to engage Online and keep up with the changing digital world. Through a series of interactive online workshops, field trips, courses and tutorials, participants can build digital presence and build employable digital skills. So, we definitely support people to advocate for themselves, build their capacity to help gain independence, not just in employment, but also in their everyday lives.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

That sounds like some great partnerships and community resources. Please tell us how Someone gets a hold of gateway services.

Betty Hahn-Sidor, Gateway Assoc.

Well, you can get a hold of us through our website, which is gatewayassociation.ca. On our website we have a calendar that shares all of our families forward meetings, our mentorship opportunities, our workshops, et cetera. We also can be found on Eventbrite to register for our many offerings.

Jasmine Hasiuk, Gateway Assoc.

Yeah. And you can also reach out to any of us through e-mail. My e-mail is Jasmine at Gateway Association. Bettys is Betty at gatewayassociation.ca or by phone, 780-454-0701 - That's here in Edmonton. And if you just give us a call, We're also happy to guide you to the great resources as well as we are kind of an endless resource bank, so we  Can kind of  Get you in touch with the right people.

Teresa Makarewich,VAD

Perfect. So, what is an interesting fact about Gateway that everyone should know?

Betty Hahn-Sidor, Gateway Assoc.

Well, as I mentioned, we were founded in 1975. So, I think it's pretty exciting that we'll be celebrating our 50th anniversary in two years’ time. And also, I guess that we have two RDSP coordinators that can help with the disability tax credit. I haven't mentioned that yet.

Jasmine Hasiuk, Gateway Assoc.

Yeah, they're and they're a Bank of knowledge. So even if they're people are just wondering about it or registered disability savings plan coordinators kind of know all the INS and outs, another really cool fact about us is this past year we collaborated with multicultural health brokers to explore the intersectionality of job seekers Experiencing disability and newcomers to Canada. So far, the pilot project has been really successful, and we're excited to see what the end of the Year results look like.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

That sounds really interesting.

Jasmine Hasiuk, Gateway Assoc.

Yeah, I think it'll be. I think we're going to have some new data that comes out regarding that intersectionality. So we're eager to kind Of compile everything.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

Yeah, that would be interesting to see the results. So thank you for your time and energy today. Betty and Jasmine, your support to the community is of value to all. Is there anything else you want to say?

Jasmine Hasiuk, Gateway Assoc.

Yeah, one last piece you want, we wanted to share about Gateway is that in 2022 we initiated our anti racism and organized organizational change journey to change and implement all aspects of our work at Gateway. So we're working to address and dismantle systemic racism and create lasting Change within our organization and we're continuing to implement our aroc process through all of our work, including workshops, meetings with job seekers or family members through partnerships, team meetings, events and pretty much anything else that we Do at gateway. So, we're on that journey right now.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

Wonderful. And Betty, anything from you?

Betty Hahn-Sidor, Gateway Assoc.

I think we've covered most of it.

Teresa Makarewich, VAD

Wonderful guys, thanks again for joining Vads podcast. voice of Albertans with disabilities is across disability nonprofit organization of and for people with disabilities. We are guided by the principles of accessibility, equity and inclusion. Learn about VAD services on our website at vadsociety.ca or call 780-488-9088 For more information. If you have a topic you would like to hear more about in a podcast, please e-mail teresa@vadsociety.ca with topic ideas, speaker suggestions, or your feedback. Signing off for the day together, we hold the power.