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Job club pilot project helps youths with autism find jobs by Kathy Yanchus Metroland West Media 25 | Friday, November 18, 2016 | OAKVILLE BEAVER | www.insideHALTON.com Imagine wanting desperately to have a job but you can't recognize faces, remember instructions or communicate effectively. And yet, if given a chance, you just might prove what research has found -- often those with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) display a higher level of productivity and lower turnover rate when compared to neurotypical workers. ASD is the leading neurological diagnosis for children and yet, as adults, the great majority of them are either unemployed or underemployed, according to Maralyn Ellis, who founded, and facilitates, Autism Job Club (of Halton) in 2015. The group is designed to support young adults with ASD who want to find work, and is an offshoot of Ellis' work at Futures Found, where she provides guidance to youths planning school and career paths. "Most of us started our career with a lot of trial and error, learning from experience over time the kind of work and the kinds of environments that allow us to play to our strengths and do good, satisfying work," said Ellis. That can be stressful and accepting a job that's not a good fit can be an employmentending mistake for someone with ASD, she said. Exact numbers of Halton youths who are in this situation are not clear, but with an increasing rate of ASD diagnoses, more are leaving school facing great barriers to person thinks, takes in and uses information, problem solves and communicates." Using the technology, Fit First successfully operated a small pilot program last year for a Sarnia agency called Job Start that placed people with mental and physical disabilities with no work experience or limited experience. Not only does the system narrow a field of potential jobs for participants, it gives employers a "direct line of sight into how strong a fit" a person will be for a position, said van der Hoop. "When employers are scrambling to find people to fill their open jobs, perhaps the most overlooked and underutilized segment of the population is those with `diffabilities'," said van der Hoop. "Time and again, research has shown when they are matched to the right role and given the right onboarding support, they are among the most productive, most loyal, most profitable employees." While the pilot study gets underway, the Autism Job Club continues to meet the first and third Mondays of the month between 7-8:30 p.m. at Robert Bateman High School, 5151 New St., Burlington. The club offers peer-to-peer support, professional guidance in resumes, interviewing and social thinking, said Ellis. For more information, email join@autismjobclub.ca. Maralyn Ellis, founder of Autism Job Club of Halton and Jan G. van der Hoop, founder of Fit First Technologies. | Jayson Mills photo Doctor4Teeth is ready to perfect your smile! employment, said Ellis. To change the odds, Autism Job Club has teamed up with Fit First Technologies to conduct a pilot study, which will apply science to help this growing and untapped resource of workers transition into the workforce. Fit First Technologies, cofounded by Jan G. van der Hoop 10 years ago, helps organizations match the right person to the right job through a system that focuses first on fit, then experience and credentials, he said. Over the years, choosing the right person for the right job, in most organizations, has been a flawed process; it's a 20 per cent success rate," said van der Hoop. "Unfortunately, the statistics for people on the spectrum are even worse. It's a group that is disadvantaged. It's a group that has huge barriers to entry and that most employers, honestly, don't know how to deal with, how to accommodate." Van der Hoop is hoping to turn his company's software science "upside down" to break down barriers those with ASD face trying to find and keep jobs. The experiment will apply a set of algorithms -- designed to help companies screen high volumes of candidates -- to an individual. Based on the assessments, participants will be projected into a library of jobs where there's greater likelihood for success, he explained. The software is specifically designed to measure behavioural makeup and cognitive abilities. "Factors that determine most how well somebody is going to do in a job, how happy they're going to be in a job, how productive they will be in a job and how long they are likely to stay in a job, have nothing to do with things on a resume; it has everything to do with who they are as individuals, in terms of their traits, their characteristics, their compatibility with the job. "And they have to do with cognitive abilities, how the In addition to our traditional office we are excited to now offer mobile dental services. Whether in your home or office, our team at Doctor4Teeth can deliver quality dental care without limitation. An After Hours and Emergency Service is available to our patients as well as anyone else in need of urgent dental care. An outreach satellite office program is also under development to help those in more rural and Indigenous areas where dental care is not readily accessible. 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