PACE is excited to share that we are an active partner in a Skills Development Fund project in collaboration with three other community partner organizations:
• Bellwoods Centres for Community Living
• Access Independent Living Services
• and Vibrant Healthcare Alliance
The project has received funding from the Ministry of Colleges and Universities to bring together this partnership within the Independent Living sector to support innovative training solutions to address the PSW labour shortage. The objectives of this important project are to:
• relieve the Personal Support Workers (PSW) recruitment and ongoing staffing challenges by providing a placement opportunity for 80 certified new PSWs graduates;
• provide certified PSWs with more advanced skills through enhanced education and training;
• increase the level of understanding about the Independent Living Philosophy and client self-directed care.
A critical focus of this project is to provide on the job experiential training for these 80 graduate PSWs over a thirteen-week period. These PSWs will receive in-depth training which will include one week of orientation followed by 12 weeks of on-the-job training (3 weeks with each partner organization). The on-the-job training entails job shadowing with experienced PSWs. It is our hope that through participation in this program, that these PSWs will choose the Independent Living Sector as the sector to work in and ultimately choose to become a PACE employee. There will be three groups of PSWs job shadowing at PACE across six of our supportive housing programs including: Broadway, Bathurst Prince Charles, Caboto, Henry Lane, Joanne Wilson and Windward.
Questions about the program should be directed to – Kimberly Gooder, Human Resources Generalist