{"id":117395,"date":"2025-08-04T05:23:09","date_gmt":"2025-08-04T05:23:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/117395\/"},"modified":"2025-08-04T05:23:09","modified_gmt":"2025-08-04T05:23:09","slug":"from-ehcps-to-work-our-internship-scheme-is-changing-lives","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/117395\/","title":{"rendered":"From EHCPs to work, our internship scheme is changing lives"},"content":{"rendered":"

Careers for SEND young people\n <\/p>\n

When young people with SEND leave education, meaningful work can feel out of reach. But our programme is flipping the script and its model could be a blueprint for change<\/p>\n

When young people with SEND leave education, meaningful work can feel out of reach. But our programme is flipping the script and its model could be a blueprint for change<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

Elizabeth Halton<\/strong><\/p>\n

Principal of Forward2Employment<\/p>\n

\n

4 Aug 2025, 5:55<\/p>\n

\"\" <\/p>\n

More from this theme<\/p>\n

Recent articles<\/p>\n

During my time in my previous career as a school leader, I witnessed first-hand how students with SEND, leaving education, struggled to gain access to meaningful work, especially in fields they were passionate about. Forward2Employment <\/a>was created in Medway and Kent to change their outcomes, by helping them gain employment through our supported internship programme.<\/p>\n

This supports young people aged 16 to 24 with an Education, Health and Care Plan (EHCP) who are based in Kent and Medway.\u00a0 The programme runs for 38 weeks, following a similar term structure to schools.\u00a0 Each week, interns attend the workplace for four days and spend one day improving their employability and independence skills.\u00a0 The aim is to support young people into paid employment<\/a> by the end of the programme, either within their placement or through references and work experience added to their CV.<\/p>\n

From humble beginnings<\/strong><\/p>\n

Forward2Employment started in 2018, with a pilot year of three interns and one job coach.\u00a0 We worked closely with one business, the medical and dental supplier Henry Schein, who partnered with us during this pilot.\u00a0 It was such a success that they hired many of the interns from that year\u2019s placement and have continued to support us by taking on supported interns each year.<\/p>\n

From this pilot, it was clear that we were onto something significant.\u00a0 We expanded further, with more businesses joining to help us on our commitment to improve the chances for our young people with SEND.\u00a0 The programme has grown rapidly, with the 2024-2025 cohort reaching 38 interns and being supported by eight job coaches.<\/p>\n

We have also further expanded our provision to include a supported employment programme, where we support people aged 18-64 with SEND into employment.\u00a0 This is by helping them with job searches, improve their CV, and even provide interview support. This programme is bespoke to each client, where we offer as much or as little support as needed.<\/p>\n

Our success has been recognised with a \u2018good\u2019 rating in both our Ofsted and British Association for Supported Employment (BASE) inspections. However, the most rewarding aspect for myself and the team is the success of our supported interns and Supported Employment clients.\u00a0 Since our pilot, we have seen 33 interns and Supported Employment clients gain paid employment, with more expected to achieve this by the end of this academic year.<\/p>\n

No plain sailing<\/strong><\/p>\n

While we have seen significant success from our programmes, there have been challenges.\u00a0 One of the biggest was the Covid pandemic.\u00a0 During lockdown, many businesses limited the number of workers due to social distancing which meant that many of our interns had to stay at home.\u00a0 However, my brilliant team ensured that the interns continued to gain experiences by using their hobbies to improve their work and independence skills, as well as strengthening their CVs and helping them apply for jobs.\u00a0 Fortunately, when lockdowns were lifted most businesses we worked with continued to support us and take on supported interns.<\/p>\n

Throughout my years in education I have seen how people with SEND can be stereotyped, and this became even clearer when starting Forward2Employment. When we began reaching out to businesses and even some young people, there was a belief that they could only achieve work in specific areas, such as labouring.\u00a0 An important role of Forward2Employment has been to debunk these beliefs and encourage businesses and interns to expand their horizons regarding what people with SEND can achieve.<\/p>\n

We\u2019re in this together<\/strong><\/p>\n

While there is still a way to go to get more people to understand that individuals with SEND can achieve their goals (sometimes with just a little bit of help), we can see that the narrative is changing.\u00a0 Schools and colleges are encouraging their students to dream about their careers, and businesses are starting to promote inclusivity in their workforces to include people with SEND.\u00a0 We hope to see this expand further and are excited to see where Forward2Employment goes on its journey to improve the outcomes for people with SEND.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Careers for SEND young people When young people with SEND leave education, meaningful work can feel out of…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":117396,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[64,73455,73456,32224,420,1269,25557,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-117395","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jobs","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-careers-for-send-young-people","10":"tag-employer-partnerships","11":"tag-internships","12":"tag-jobs","13":"tag-opinion","14":"tag-send","15":"tag-united-states","16":"tag-unitedstates","17":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/114968828632250694","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117395","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=117395"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117395\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/117396"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=117395"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=117395"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=117395"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}