News
Awards for All
We are delighted to have been awarded a Big Lottery, Awards for All Grant of £9,982 towards our work experience project with Spa School at Best Italian Borough Market.
Project Search
In November 2009, CareTrade formed the Southwark Partnership and won an Office of Disability Issues bid to form one of 14 national evaluation sites for Project SEARCH here in the UK.
Project SEARCH is an exciting employment-focussed education programme to develop skills and experience for the workplace.
It is a full time one year programme and The Southwark Partnership will be starting the only Project SEARCH programme here in the Capital in September 2010 at Guys and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust.
What is Project SEARCH?
Project SEARCH is designed to give students with learning disabilities the opportunity to learn more about the world of work, develop their employability skills, to try out their skills in real work placements and to help them secure and keep paid permanent work at the end of the course.
Project SEARCH originated in the USA at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital 14 years ago. Today there are over 120 sites in the States and the employment success rate at the end of the course is about 70%. This compares to an employment rate of just 15% in the UK for people with autism and/or learning disabilities. Project SEARCH is now running in the UK. To date six students have completed the programme at the Norfolk and Norwich University Hospital. Four are in full time employment. You can hear what the students have to say on
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x8Sl-txtJiig or watch a film about the project http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ea_JOiZRyGM
The Southwark Partnership led by CareTrade is the only London based project and the only autism specific project in the country. It brings together the expertise of the CareTrade, Prospects (the National Autistic Society), Remploy, Spa School, Southwark Council Learning Disabilities and Transition Teams, and Guys and St Thomas’ NHS Foundation Trust.
Students will be based at St Thomas’ Hospital for the whole academic year and will have the opportunity to experience 3 different job rotations. The course runs 5 days a week combining classroom training and on the job training using a person centred planning approach. The Southwark Partnership are currently recruiting students for the first year, starting in September 2010 and we will be holding an information day on Thursday 20 May 3-5pm at Remploy offices, 202-206 Union Street, London, SE1 0LH. Everyone is welcome.
If you would like further information about applying please email 
You can support the work of CareTrade’s working classroom Best Italian by shopping with us online! Purchase our wonderful ‘in house’ Bestagno Extra Virgin Olive Oil and other Artisanal Italian goodies by clicking here for the Best Italian online store. Don’t forget all profits from our online shopping go towards supporting the work of CareTrade @ Best Italian and that’s a massive £10 pure profit per half litre of the most scrumptious Extra Virgin Olive Oil!
As importantly shopping at Best Italian online will create many more real work experience opportunities for young people with autism! Your oil will be packed and posted by a young person with autism so it’s a great way to support our work!
