Most youth with Intellectual Developmental Disorder (IDD) would not be able even think of being on their own, doing their much of their own chores, maintaining their living spaces and going to work. Yet, this is exactly what the NS CLOVE (Nithya Saadhana – Community Living Orientation and Value Entity) is doing. It is changing the basic tenets of a mind-set that believed that youth with IDD were dependent upon others for most aspects of their living and lifestyle.
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Special Projects
NS-CLOVE – Community Living Orientation and Value Entity
PROJECT MYSORE
After training more than two hundred differently abled young adults in the field of electronics, data entry and placing more than hundreds of them in the main stream, Nithya Saadhana ventured into yet another project at Mysore.
Known as Project Mysore, this project, which comes under the NS CLOVE project, is a residential facility instituted by Nithya Saadhana in October 2021. It is meant for the trainees who have been placed at TECHSER POWER SOLUTIONS Mysore. The house is about 3 kilometers from the factory and boys who are employed in the factory stay there. This residential facility has all the basic facilities like kitchen, bedrooms, furniture, refrigerator, washing machine and more required for daily living. The house, which can accommodate four people with a coordinator, equips its residents to manage the household activities and attend to their job with ease. The residents, those who are placed in TECHSER POWER SOLUTIONS, are trained in housekeeping, basic cooking required for day to day living, purchase of groceries, milk etc. for their daily needs, time management to reach the work place on time, physical exercise for fitness. The food for them will be provided as per the daily schedule made. Since the start, the occupants are very much at home and performing their daily routine very well. The plan is to extend this program for people after three years of successful show. The parents are allowed to visit the place with a prior information and occupants are allowed to go to their homes with prior intimation.
Thus, NS – CLOVE has successfully facilitated the process for inclusion and mainstreaming by equipping its residents.
WEEKEND COMMUNITY LIVING & LIFE SKILLS PROGRAM
Nithya Saadhana is also managing a COMMUNITY LIVING & LIFE SKILLS TRAINING PROGRAM for differently abled young adults during weekends from August 2016 at Attiguppe.
During this three months program, the participants are trained in personal hygiene and daily living skills, concept of money/time/social skills and conduct. Domain experts visit the centre to train the participants.
In a residential facility the trainees stay all through the week days during which they go to work or internship and return from their work places to what they consider their second home. Nithya Saadhana is proud to say that it has successfully completed several batches of training in community living skills.
As stated earlier, these programs go a long way in paving the way for inclusion and mainstreaming of youth with IDD.
Group Games
Daily Living Skills
They are taught cooking a simple meal, cleaning and ironing clothes. They also learn table manners and sharing of the food that they have cooked.
Activities
The Activities are Art based and other hands on therapy like group discussion and Drum Jam
At the end of each program certificates are given to the trainees
New batches commence regularly, looking at the benefits for the trainees and the excellent feedback we have received from the parents
Feedback
Rashmi, is one of the resource persons working with the children at the community living skills training program.
Her activities and their benefits are as follows:
- Colouring the mandalas was very effective in keeping students relaxed and it also helped them to come out with few emotional problems which were addressed. (Mandala helps people to bring in discipline and subconsciously trains our mind to do repetitive actions by repeating patterns)
- Self awareness exercises were conducted which helped them to understand their strengths and deal with their limitations.
- Activities related to interpersonal relationships were done.
- Gratitude and thanks giving activity was done and this made the students realise and think of people who are helping them.
- Activity sheet related to “Understanding one’s emotions and how to deal them” was also done.
- “The tree- Grounding meditation” was taught to help students to keep them grounded and strong along with few affirmations.
Rashmi says “Hope to help them further. Thank you for giving me an opportunity to work with them. Along with them, I too have learnt so much which has helped me to grow professionally and personally.”
Latha & Nikhil spend time in the weekend interacting with the students, training them in various areas. Nikhil especially teaches the keyboard and also discusses a few mythological stories.
Latha says “I really appreciate the eagerness with which everyone participated. They adjusted to all situations without complaining. Even when the power went away, they made sure the task was completed. The concept is wonderful and I learnt quite a few things from the children”
NS-VISTA (Nithya Saadhana - Vocational Instructor Skill Training Academy)
For mainstreaming youth with Intellectual Developmental Disorder and differently abled persons, the role of special educators, vocational instructors or parents is an important one. In an endeavor to go beyond training at its premises to youth with IDD, Nithya Saadhana aimed to strengthen the system by training job coaches. This would expand the scope of training youth with IDD present in various places.
NS VISTA has a diploma course designed with the guidance of our advisor Meena Jain (designation). The curriculum focuses on creating job coaches who will liaison between the vocational institutes that train persons with intellectual developmental disabilities and companies that are willing to provide jobs for these persons.
NS VISTA was inaugurated by Mr.Basavaraju, Commissioner of Disabilities, Dr. Deepak Jayarajan of NIMHANS & Ms. Meena Jain, a rehabilitation expert, commenced in August 2019, with the first lecture by Dr. Shoba Srinath of NIMHANS. The doctors from the department of Psychiatric Rehabilitation Services took many guest lectures. We are deeply indebted to them and honoured that they could spend their time. We also had eminent persons from different sectors in the industry like hospitality, retail, electronics, education etc. who discussed the employers’ point of view while hiring the persons with disability. The participants of VISTA also had the opportunity to visit different training centres in Bangalore to get a clear picture of the programs running. A market survey of the job roles and job analysis was also done by them. The participants had a good number of theory sessions and assignments to complete the course.
Nithya Saadhana also commenced an online training program “BE A JOB COACH” for those who want to be in the rehabilitation sector, for assisting adults with IDD get placed in jobs in the mainstream of society. There are 10 sessions of 2 hours each which includes Overview, family dynamics, Effective transition, Curriculum Development for vocational training, best practices, Role of a JOB COACH and interactive sessions with specialists from the rehab sector and corporates of different skill sectors.
Sibling Support Group
A SIBLING SUPPORT GROUP has been initiated by NITHYA SAADHANA in 2016. This is a group of the brothers, sisters, next of kin, of the special young adults who are trainees with us.
We have regular meetings of the siblings, where they discuss the challenges faced by the families and the future of the special persons. They exchange views on the responsibilities they expect to have with regards to their special sibling.
The group also speaks about areas where they can work together as a forum – for example – arranging a guest speaker for gathering important and relevant information, getting air travel concession, insurance for medical emergencies, general regular annual health check up by tying up with a friendly hospital and also getting all the benefits available from the government for persons with disability.