EmployAbility Expo

Posted onAuthorRobyn Gross

On Wednesday May 1st, 2019 the Bucks IU host­ed their annu­al EmployAbility Expo. Held at the Bucks IU’s Administrative Building in Doylestown PA, this event drew over 100 Bucks County high school stu­dents with dis­abil­i­ties who were inter­est­ed in prac­tic­ing and devel­op­ing the con­fi­dence, skills, and strate­gies they will need to obtain and retain employ­ment in today’s econ­o­my.

The morn­ing began with Robyn Gross, Bucks IU Education Marketing Lead, serv­ing as moti­va­tion­al keynote speak­er to set the tone, get the stu­dents to relax, and help focus them so that they could each get the full ben­e­fit of the Expo. The inter­ac­tive pre­sen­ta­tion stressed prepar­ing and prac­tic­ing with a take away mes­sage about mak­ing pos­i­tives out of any mis­takes so that they get turned into a learn­ing expe­ri­ence. Breakout ses­sions were then offered to sup­port and train the stu­dents in areas such as strate­gies on find­ing a job, pro­fes­sion­al­ism, work­place eti­quette, and how to cre­ate crit­i­cal job doc­u­ments such as résumés and portfolios.

Each stu­dent also had the oppor­tu­ni­ty to par­tic­i­pate in at least three prac­tice job inter­views with vol­un­teer per­son­nel from area busi­ness­es and

orga­ni­za­tions. The stu­dents gained valu­able hands-on expe­ri­ence on how to com­port them­selves in a pro­fes­sion­al man­ner while answer­ing var­i­ous stan­dard ques­tions. Upon com­ple­tion of each inter­view, the stu­dents were giv­en imme­di­ate feed­back on how well they did.

Our sin­cere thanks to the fol­low­ing busi­ness­es and orga­ni­za­tions for sup­port­ing this impor­tant event by pro­vid­ing the out­stand­ing inter­view­ers for the students:

AHEDD
Altman Management Group
Bucks County Department of Mental Health/Developmental Programs (MH/DP)
County of Bucks
Dun & Bradstreet
ECRI Institute
ESS Mission One
Excel Home Care
Flatiron School
Indian Creek Foundation
Ivy Hill Therapeutic Equestrian Center
JBT Corporation – Automated Systems
Juno Search Partners
Lenape Valley Foundation
Office of Vocational Rehabilitation
Oldcastle Precast
Operant Coffee, LLC
PA CareerLink Bucks County – Bristol
Pennridge School District
Premier Brokerage Services, Inc.
SEPA SHRM
Sesame Place
SPIN
UPS
YMCA of Bucks County – Doylestown