Trampoline

Trampoline

Promotion of employability and inclusion of physically and socially disadvantaged people in the labour market

The Trampoline programme aims to improve the chances of disadvantaged and disabled people to make it in the labour market through the development of key skills required by the market today. The programme works closely with employers and non-governmental organisations based in Eastern Slovakia to offer various forms of informal education, mentoring and internships in the region.

The programme, which was launched in 2014 and has trained 77 participants to date, won the National Career Counselling Award in 2018 

The main target groups that our Trampoline gave a jump start to on their way to better job opportunities were:

  1. Young adults from Roma communities and from socially disadvantaged communities
  2. University graduates fresh out of school in the Košice and Prešov regions
  3. Physically handicapped people

In the period of years 2014 – 2015, the programme was implemented with the support of the Active Citizenship and Inclusion programme administered by Ekopolis Foundation.

In 2016, the programme was implemented with the support of the T-Systems Slovakia Endowment Fund administered by the Carpathian Foundation, and in the period of 2016 – 2018, the programme implementation was supported by the Erasmus+ programme.

ITrampolína pre všetkých 2016 – 2018 (ITrampoline 4 All 2016 - 2018)

The most recent, 3rd year of the programme, which lasted from 3rd October, 2016 until 30th July, 2018, focused on the topic of inclusion of physically handicapped people in the IT sector as an industry that lacks qualified workforce in Eastern Slovakia. This edition of the programme won the National Career Counselling Award 2018

Within the scope of the programme, inclusion of people with disabilities was enhanced through an innovative model for the development of individual potential, helping them to integrate into the working environment in the IT sector. The model has been developed and implemented as part of a public-private partnership and an international exchange of experience.

Project outputs: A Development Centre model consisting of 2 tools:

Vocational Potential Assessment Centre

Our pilot assessment centre is diversity sensitive. It uses a set of evaluation methods and activities to assess participants in a way which does not automatically see ‘otherness’ as a disadvantage. On the contrary, otherness and diversity are seen as qualities that are beneficial for the organisation. The assessment centre model is a tool that is capable of directing participants towards a number of alternatives for their career development and self-assertion based on their individual performance. Read more

Elevator Development Centre

Elevator Development Centre works with the individual performance results the participants have shown during the Assessment Centre phase. In the Development Centre, we define individual tailored goals for the participants so that they can fulfil the qualification requirements for specific positions. Participants’ competences and talents are mapped and their individual development plans are defined. The Centre for Development offers 3 internal training programmes that take into account specific needs of employees with disabilities or disadvantages. In the pilot phase, the method was tested on candidates selected on the basis of their performance in the Assessment Centre. Read more

Partners

Activities

Activities successfully completed in this cycle of the programme included international project partner meetings, Trampoline interactive training, development and testing of outputs, short-term training activities for in-house lecturers from the IT companies involved, internships for disadvantaged participants in an IT company in Debrecen (HU) and a panel discussion entitled IT4All: Opportunity for Everyone which took place on 24 May, 2018 with the participation of programme participants, non-profit organizations, self-governmental authorities and IT companies.

Contact

Barbara Kollárová, programme manager
barbara.kollarova@karpatskanadacia.sk

Testimonials of programme participants

Short report from RTVS on programme ITrampoline 4 all