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Case Study: Andy

Andy is a young man with Downs Syndrome who came to live in the care of his aunt in Britain at the age of 10. He attended a Special School where he made lots of friends and started to learn new skills and develop better speech.
At the age of 19 he left School and attended a local College 3 days per week where he became more confident and increased his own expectations which led to him wanting to investigate the possibilities of employment. He was referred to our services for assistance in achieving employment. At this point he had very little knowledge on what employment’ entailed, he was also over confident in many areas and believed himself to be more capable than he actually was.

With structured training in what the “world of work” is about e.g. appropriate behaviour in the work place, why do we work, why it is important to be reliable, punctual, work as part of a team we set up a work placement starting at one day per week within a nursing home environment in the position of Domestic.
At this point Andy was relying up one of our Job Coaches to support him with independent travel skills which included road safety training, using public transport, having correct change for fares, what to do in cases of emergencies (i.e. the bus missed or was late). We had to get back to basics buying him an alarm clock teaching him how to tell the time, how to set the alarm the importance of been on time. We also provided one to one support in the work place breaking down tasks into small routines putting together a structured work plan which the Job Coach followed this would ensure a systematic work routine was built up.

Due to Andy’s limited literacy skills we had to devise a method for Andy being able to identify which bedrooms he had cleaned and which rooms still needed cleaning we came up with pictorial system in the form of card shaped into clothes hangers so he could hang them on the doors.

We also had to buy Andy a watch with an alarm so that we could set his watch to buzz at the start and finish of break times and at the time he finished work.

After long-term support both with travel training and in work support Andy, built up stamina, gained more confidence improved his communication skills and increased the number of days he worked and was eventually offered permanent employment he now travels and works independently.

Andy now wants to increase his independence to the point where he will be able to look for work or training in the mainstream.