Employment Pathways Programs

Experiences help you learn what you like and what you are good at. You also build skills and confidence. All of this helps you plan your education and career.

Work-related experiences during high school make it more likely you will have a job as an adult. Work is linked to social inclusion, income and overall health and wellbeing. 

People with disabilities often face barriers getting early work experiences. Your family’s high expectations and active support from an organization like Holland Bloorview can help you get started.

We regularly survey our program participants and families. In 2024, 100% of participants strongly agreed and agreed:

• “Participating in a practical work experience helped me on my journey to be better prepared for the workforce”.

• “As I continue on my journey towards the workforce, I feel better prepared after participating in this program.”

• “My experience in this program was valuable - it helped me meet my goals regarding volunteering or employment.”

Our team is led by occupational therapists who have experience in education and employment inclusion. Our youth facilitator and family support specialist shares lived experience of participating in school and work. We often refer to ourselves as “job coaches” and our team includes summer/seasonal staff who also do job coaching.

Program staff

Note - most of our staff work part-time

	Kari Renahan, Clinical team lead & cccupational therapist First point of contact for youth interested in our programs Youth@Work & VolunteerABLE programs
	Laura Howson Strong, Clinical team lead & occupational therapist Employment Action Coaching & Ready to Work programs
	Mathias Castaldo, Youth facilitator & family support specialist Youth workshops Family virtual sessions Education & employer inclusion presentations
	Julia Corsini, Occupational therapist
	Danielle D’Alessandro, Occupational therapist
	Jill Gilders, Occupational therapy assistant
	Armaan Badhan, Job coach (client services assistant) (seasonal)
	Shaelynn Hsu, Job coach (client services assistant) (seasonal)
	Prajeeth Sachchithananthan, Job coach (client services assistant) (seasonal)

Leadership, community engagement, advocacy, research, evaluation & knowledge mobilization staff

	Carolyn McDougall Manager, Employment Pathways Education/Employment Inclusion Initiatives Ontario/Canada Coordinator, Project SEARCH Business Liaison for Project SEARCH Toronto at Holland Bloorview (co-site host)
	Laura Bowman, Project manager, research, evaluation & knowledge mobilization
	Anna Oh, Research & project coordinator
	Joanne Close, Project manager, education & employment inclusion (occasional/contract)

• “There’s much more certainty in terms of what I'm doing. I was thinking of just going to school, post-secondary. This experience gives me a sense of what kind of work I want. I found even more purpose for going to school. I have way more motivation now than before to enhance my skills set. (Youth)

• “We never could have imagined it. He really enjoys having a job… It helps us to broaden our vision of what we can do and how many choices we have in the future.  In the past, I was struggling with whether or not he could find a "real" job. Until  we did these programs and I followed the programs step-by-step, we were so concerned that he would never find a job...” (Parent)

• “The fact that I have experience and actually earned money with my own hard work filled me with confidence that I can do it later on. This job is a benchmark for the type of jobs that I want later in life and what type of jobs that I don't want to do.” (Youth)

Watch videos with Sam and other past participants of employment pathways programs.

Bav talks about Holland Bloorview's Ready to Work program and how it helped him get ready for a summer job with Fidelity.

Nat describes the Youth@Work program.

Nick talks about what he learned at Project SEARCH Toronto and how Project SEARCH and other Holland Bloorview life skills programs helped him move from school to work.

Charlie's story describes how Holland Bloorview's VolunteerABLE and Employment Action Coaching programs helped Charlie and his family. The story includes some job coaching and accommodation examples from Charlie's job with Aqua-Tots Swim Schools.

Isaiah describes what he learned while doing a summer job with BASF. Annie talks about how her summer job at Lane Four Consulting helped her build skills. Read about Isaiah & Annie.

Jordan and his manager talk about his work experience at Joe Fresh.

• Explore Canada’s Skills for Success. Resources and videos explain skills you’ll need for learning, working and being active in your community.
• Connectability.ca  ConnectABILITY.ca  is an accessible, self-directed website of information and tools dedicated to lifelong learning and support for people who have an intellectual disability, their families and support networks.
• Disability Foundation YLI Employment Toolkit Provides tips and guidance for those with disabilities with common employment challenges such as building self-confidence, coping with stress, etc.
• Alberta’s Alis website Gives information on different types of jobs with their descriptions, requirements, pay. It also has suggestions for exploring post-secondary education and training.
• Family Support Network for Employment is a family-led support for families who have youth with intellectual disabilities to find resources and supports for employment.
• The Ontario Disability Employment Network (ODEN) has developed resources for families and educators to provide practical suggestions about expecting and preparing for employment, across all ages from kindergarten to grade 12.
• The early years: Career development for young children – is a free book that provides parents with ways to support their children aged 3 to 8 years old in career development through activities and play. Download free book from CERIC
• The decade after high school: A parent’s guide Download free book from CERIC is a free book that helps parents with assisting their young people in the navigation of the transition to further education or joining the workforce through roles, activities, and resources. 

Holland Bloorview’s evidence-based Employment Pathways were developed to help youth with disabilities to gain experiences with work. Our implementation guides help service providers offer employment experience programming to youth in their own communities.

Employment Pathways Implementation Guides: 

1. Introduction and program background guide  - COMING SOON
2. Staff training and coaching guide - COMING SOON
3. Self-discovery phase guide  - COMING SOON
4. Employment action coaching guide  - COMING SOON
5. Intensive supportive work experience programs guide  - COMING SOON
6. Funding and administration guide - COMING SOON
7. Work life skills guide - COMING SOON

Project Support: Funded and operated under funding from Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital Foundation including the Azrieli Foundation.

Contact: Laura Bowman lbowman@hollandbloorview.ca 

Access free tools to help you, your family, your community, and your organization to raise awareness and advocate for funding for youth employment programs. Our resources include downloadable information, presentations, advocacy letters, and background materials. 

Contact: Carolyn McDougall cmcdougall@hollandbloorview.ca

Early engagement in employment-related activities is associated with greater lifetime labor force attachment, which correlates with positive health, social, and quality of life outcomes. People with disabilities often require vocational intervention to enter and remain in the workforce and reap the employment-related health and social benefits. Their labor force attachment brings about the added societal-level benefits of increased tax contributions and reduced social assistance funding.  

Based on available evidence and best practices, and in conjunction with expert input, a cost–benefit model was constructed to provide support for public investment in early employment intervention by demonstrating the societal-level benefits that could be projected. Results indicate the potential benefits for investment in early, targeted employment intervention at a societal level. Two personas were crafted to demonstrate the lifetime societal-level impact of investment in intervention for an individual with disabilities. The results provide relevant arguments for advocates, policy makers, program directors, and people entering adulthood with disabilities to understand the benefits of investing in interventions with the goal of long-term public savings.

We propose that the projected savings to government over the lifetime of the individuals should be proactively (upstream) invested into funding the start-early programming for youth with disabilities as modeled in the papers. 

You can access our publication in Frontiers in Sociology here and our updated report following Ontario’s Integrated Employment Services transformation. 

Partners: Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital, Ontario Disability Employment Network (ODEN), Chronicle Analytics

Funder: Government of Ontario and Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital Foundation

Contact: Laura Bowman lbowman@hollandbloorview.ca 

Employment participation is a social determinant of health, contributing to social, mental, and physical wellbeing of individuals and communities. Early employment experiences like volunteering, co-operative education, and paid work during high school can help to predict post-school employment success for youth with disabilities. For example, employment during high school is associated with higher rates of employment in adulthood, increased wages later in life, increased desirability as a job candidate later on, and better general health. 

Yet, employment remains just one social determinant of health. We know that, from an intersectional approach, there are many individual, cultural, environmental, and societal factors that contribute to one’s access programs and best practice opportunities. To better understand who the Employment Pathways programs are (and are not) reaching, we undertook a health equity-based sociodemographic project. Our goal was to identify the groups we were reaching, consider them in the broader context of our organizational and local communities, and ultimately reach broader population groups in ways that are practically and culturally meaningful. We did this from an LHS perspective, which creates “an environment of continuous improvement and innovation, where internal data, research and experiential knowledge are used collaboratively across clinicians, researchers, operations, children, youth and families to inform the best possible care and outcomes. In a learning health system, trying new ideas, embracing failure and success, is encouraged and incentivized” (Holland Bloorview, n.d.).

This is part of a larger initiative in which Holland Bloorview, along with other Toronto Academic Health Sciences Network (TAHSN) hospitals, are collecting client and family demographic information “to ensure that every client has access to the highest quality of health care that we can provide”. They share with clients and families that “[t]he information you provide will: 1) tell us who we serve, 2) help us plan for services that will be the most helpful for your child, and 3) help us improve quality of care for all”. The survey includes data related to language; racial group; immigration; disability status and supports; sex, gender, and sexuality; and finances and income.

Project manager & contact: Laura Bowman lbowman@hollandbloorview.ca 

Primary contributors: Carolyn McDougall, Anna Oh, Samuel Cheng, Sri Vijay Bharat Peddi, Stephanie McFarland 

Check back soon for results summaries

Canadians with disabilities have the highest unemployment rates in Canada, despite capacity and desire to contribute to the labour force. The rate is even higher for young individuals with disabilities. This is a particular issue due to the evidence supporting that early work experiences is correlated to lifetime labour force attachment. Transition to work programs for youth with disabilities are gaining momentum and building evidence-based support for improving labour force attachment for participating youth with disabilities. One such program model with strong evidence-based support and supporting research is Project SEARCH. Project SEARCH has demonstrated great success with connecting youth with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) to competitive and immersive employment following program completion. What is not known about Project SEARCH and similar program models is how the program elements work together to make a Project SEARCH site work well. To gain insight into the workings of a “successful” Project SEARCH site, we will undertake a descriptive case study of the Project SEARCH Toronto program. Through this study, we will explore: (1) how the people involved in the programs engage in the various program elements; and (2) how the identified elements are perceived as impactful by those people. The research questions and interpretation will be guided by an implementation science framework: the Consolidated Framework for Implementation Research (CFIR). Study findings will impact how Project SEARCH Toronto services are delivered, our understanding of job skills training interventions, and the experiences that relate to workforce development program successes.

Primary Investigators: Laura Bowman lbowman@hollandbloorview.ca, Dolly Menna-Dack

Partner Agencies: University Health Network, Toronto District School Board

Check back soon for results summaries

“Starting Early: Preparing systems, employers, families, & youth”. September 27, 2024. hosted by VRAIE-IDEA

“Book launch: Intellectual Disabilities and Autism: Ethics and Practice” March 19, 2025. Hosted by University of Toronto Joint Centre for Bioethics

Bowman, L.R., McDougall, C., D’Alessandro, D., Campbell, J., & Curran, C.J. (2023). The creation and implementation of an employment participation pathway for youth with disabilities. Disability and Rehabilitation, 45(24), 4156-4164. https://doi.org/10.1080/09638288.2022.2140846  

Bowman, L.R., Oh, A., Xu, Y., Ellis, S., Archer, J., McDougall, C., Niles-Campbell, N., Renahan, K., & Curran, C.J. (2024). Putting Youth in Charge: A multi-year interagency community engagement program for youth with disabilities and their families. Developmental Neurorehabilitation. Online. https://doi.org/10.1080/17518423.2024.2331440 

Bowman, L.R., McDougall, C., Doucet, R., Pooran, B., Xu, Y. & Campbell, J. (2024). Funding Employment Inclusion for Ontario Youth with Disabilities: A Theoretical Cost-Benefit Model. Frontiers in Sociology. https://doi.org/10.3389/fsoc.2024.1281088 

Bowman, L.R., McDougall, C., & Menna-Dack, D. (2024). A justice perspective on an ecologically-based employment pathways for youth individuals with disabilities. In J. Vogt and A. Bianchi (Eds.), Intellectual disabilities and autism: Ethics and practice. Springer.

Bowman, L.R., McDougall, C., Doucet, R., Pooran, B., Xu, Y. & Campbell, J. (2024). Funding Employment Inclusion for Ontario Youth with Disabilities: A Cost-Benefit Model UPDATE REPORT. Self-published, available from: https://hollandbloorview.ca/sites/default/files/2024-09/Funding-Employment-Inclusion-2024_0.pdf 

• See more information on Holland Bloorview’s advocacy website: Disability in the Workplace
• Key reference, Project SEARCH: Wehman, P., Schall, C., McDonough, J., Sima, A., Brooke, A., Ham, W., ... & Riehle, E. (2020). Competitive employment for transition-aged youth with significant impact from autism: A multi-site randomized clinical trial. Journal of autism and developmental disorders, 50(6), 1882-1897. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-019-03940-2
• Key reference, transitions out of high school: Kohler, P. D., Gothberg, J. E., Fowler, C., and Coyle, J. (2016). Taxonomy for transition programming 2.0: A model for planning, organizing, and evaluating transition education, services, and programs. Western Michigan University. Available at www.transitionta.org

Funding for the programs included in Holland Bloorview’s Employment Pathways are provided by donors to Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital Foundation including the RBC Foundation in support of RBC Future Launch (2021-2026), the Azrieli Foundation (2022-2027) and the Peter Gilgan Foundation (2016-2023). Our research, knowledge mobilization & advocacy activities are supported by the Azrieli Foundation (2022-2027) except where other funders are specifically acknowledged in project summaries.