Charged Up for Work program
Edge’s Charged Up for Work (CUFW) program supports high school students to prepare for their upcoming transition from school to work.
As an employment pathway for school students with disability or long-term health conditions, CUFW helps students start their journey towards paid employment, work experience, or further education. Our goal is to provide students with the right skills and tools to set them up for future success.
CUFW was introduced as a pilot program in 2020 in partnership with Curtin University, and has already been a huge success. With the help of Edge Training, we developed and delivered a unique workshop series for the first two school terms of 2021. We are incredibly inspired by this program and expect it to go from strength to strength. The feedback so far has been overwhelmingly positive, as well as some helpful recommendations for future improvements.
Our CUFW program to date has delivered workshops to 50 students, with another 22 students enrolled in Term 3. The training has been so successful that some participants have shown a preference for attending the CUFW workshops, rather than going to their mainstream school classes. This engagement has been amazing to see.
Once each student completes the CUFW program, our support doesn’t stop there. We are fortunate to work collaboratively with Perth businesses to create tailored employment pathways for students who have completed their workshops. These include paid work opportunities, work experience, and receiving referrals to Disability Employment Services and Australian Disability Enterprises.
To date, we’ve placed 12 students in school-based traineeships, two students in paid employment, and gained work experience placements for multiple students.
Students have shown considerable growth in confidence and independence both during and after the workshops. We are truly proud and encouraged to see the positive change in these students, and to watch them adapt and thrive in new environments.
A parent of one of the students recently had this to say: “What I loved was that CUFW was delivered in a ‘non-disability’ way and everyone made my daughter feel valued. Now she wants to do it all again, despite already graduating!”
We feel deeply privileged at Edge to be able to work with such an inspiring group of youths, and to watch them grow and achieve their own hard-earned success. At the same time, we’re excited to see what the future holds for this program. We are continuing to receive overwhelming interest from schools across Perth who are wanting to engage their students in CUFW, so we look forward to making that happen.