{"id":286588,"date":"2025-10-08T13:16:13","date_gmt":"2025-10-08T13:16:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/286588\/"},"modified":"2025-10-08T13:16:13","modified_gmt":"2025-10-08T13:16:13","slug":"hundreds-of-job-seekers-flock-to-autism-career-fair","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/286588\/","title":{"rendered":"Hundreds of job seekers flock to autism career fair"},"content":{"rendered":"

Hager Kassab says she’s been job hunting for so long she’s lost track of how many years she’s spent looking.<\/p>\n

Kassab lives in Cornwall, Ont., but wants to move to Ottawa to be closer to family. <\/p>\n

“It’s hard for me specifically to find work because there’s not a lot of jobs out there for people who have [a] disability,” she said.<\/p>\n

Kassab is one of the hundreds of people who showed up at a job fair for autistic people Tuesday at the Sir John A. Macdonald Building in downtown Ottawa.<\/p>\n

\"AnHager Kassab was one of the hundreds of job seekers who attended the Spectrum Works Career Fair in downtown Ottawa. (Jodie Applewaithe\/CBC)<\/p>\n

The Spectrum Works Career Fair is an annual event, held this year in Ottawa and Toronto, dedicated to creating meaningful employment opportunities for job seekers with autism.<\/p>\n

This edition of the career fair comes amid a harsh job market. According to Statistics Canada, the unemployment rate rose to 7.1 per cent in August \u2013 the highest rate since May 2016, excluding the pandemic years.<\/p>\n

For people with disabilities, the numbers are even more bleak. <\/p>\n

I’ll get to the interview portion, and then I tell them I have a limited amount of hours because of my disability and then it’s like crickets.\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200b\u200b- Greyson Toombes, job seeker<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Across Canada, Statistics Canada<\/a> has observed lower employment rates for people with disabilities compared to those without. The body says the largest gaps last year were observed in Quebec and Ontario.<\/p>\n

According to the 2017 Canadian Survey on Disability<\/a>, only 33 per cent of Canadians between the ages of 20 and 64 with autism are employed.<\/p>\n

Neil Forester, the co-founder of Spectrum Works, said the job fair was designed to change that.<\/p>\n

“It’s really about bridging that gap,” he said.<\/p>\n

Discrimination in the job search<\/p>\n

According to Forester, the Ottawa job fair met its capacity with 300 people registering to attend.<\/p>\n

The event featured 11 employers and several agencies aimed at helping job seekers find work \u2014 a beacon of hope for some of the candidates who dropped by.<\/p>\n

“To find an event like this is really exciting,” said Greyson Toombes.<\/p>\n

Since he graduated from Algonquin College’s radio broadcasting program in April, Toombes said looking for a job has been “disheartening.”<\/p>\n

\"AnGreyson Toombes has been looking for a job since he graduated from Algonquin College’s radio broadcasting program in April. (Jodie Applewaithe\/CBC)<\/p>\n

“I’ll get to the interview portion, and then I tell them I have a limited amount of hours because of my disability and then it’s like crickets. I get ghosted.”<\/p>\n

“It’s not fair that they kind of discriminate against us because we can do things the same as everyone else,” Toombes continued. <\/p>\n

“We just might need a little more time or a little more understanding than your typical candidate.”<\/p>\n

Another attendee, Rodney Smith, said he’s come up against similar barriers during his job search. It began last February when he was laid off from his retail job.<\/p>\n

“In the interviews, I think they noticed I sound different when I answer questions,” said Smith.<\/p>\n

A glimmer of hope for job seekers<\/p>\n

Forester, the job fair’s co-founder, said the event has connected hundreds of people to jobs since it began in 2017.<\/p>\n

“We have been very successful in finding a lot of people employment and I think that’s what really kind of pushes us to keep doing this event.”<\/p>\n

While many walked away from the event hopeful, some job seekers were skeptical about whether any job prospects would arise from the career fair.<\/p>\n

“It’s not a lot [of hope], but it is a little,” Kassab said before surveying the remaining booths. <\/p>\n

Given how long and arduous her job search has been, Kassab said she’ll take whatever crops up.<\/p>\n

“I’m open to anything that is accommodating to part-time [work] and the hours I can do,” she said.<\/p>\n

Toronto’s job fair happens Oct. 17. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hager Kassab says she’s been job hunting for so long she’s lost track of how many years she’s…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":286589,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[64,420,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-286588","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jobs","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-jobs","10":"tag-united-states","11":"tag-unitedstates","12":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115338739152785403","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286588","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=286588"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/286588\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/286589"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=286588"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=286588"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=286588"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}