Women Working Program

The collaboration between Alternative to Incarceration (ATI) programs and the Adaptive Design Association Inc. is designed to offer women on probation, parole, court-mandated community service and currently enrolled in an ATI program a short-term paid internship experience. As a first work experience, interns are expected to learn and implement a clearly defined set of hard and soft skills. An essential internship component is educational -- interns are exposed to the mission of ADA.

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Interning and serving the community

During the internship experience, women learn fabrication skills for making assistive devices. An example of an assistive device is the tangible symbol card. This is a communication tool ideal for children with low-vision, blindness, hearing impairment, or other speech, language, and learning needs. Producing cues is a hands-on multi-stage process. More than 5,000 tangible symbol card are made annually and distributed nationwide.

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Program outcomes

The effectiveness of Women Working program is demonstrated through the completion of the internship program and by qualitative intake and exit interviews. 

 

Since the program inception, more than 280 women have been served.