To prepare people with disabilities for employment, The Arc of Indiana launched the Erskine Green Training Institute (EGTI) nearly a decade ago. The institute is now undergoing a new development that’s important to note as we recognize National Disability Employment Awareness Month (NDEAM).
Until last summer, EGTI existed only in Muncie. Now, thanks to a $500,000 grant from the IU Health Community Impact Investment Fund, the institute counts Riley Hospital as its newest training site, which opened its doors to EGTI students earlier this year.
Riley offers trainees the chance to work in various service areas throughout the hospital — from food management to housekeeping, medical inventory and patient transport.
Although Riley doesn’t always have job openings available, the EGTI training program gives students a wide variety of skills they can apply to any workplace.
The institute sees 80% of its graduates secure jobs after training — a statistic that significantly surpasses the current national employment rate of 19% for people with disabilities.
Compared to companies that employ people without disabilities, employers see less turnover among EGTI graduates.
For more information about EGTI, visit erskinegreentraininginstitute.org.
It’s good to see EGTI expanding to a second site at Riley Hospital — the range of departments trainees can rotate through there, from food service to housekeeping and patient transport, gives a program like this a lot more placement options than a single site did. When a training program grows that fast, the list of employer contacts you’re emailing about openings or site visits grows with it, and a few bad addresses left over from an old partner list are enough to get an outreach email flagged. I run our list through email list cleaning before each round of employer emails so only valid addresses go out.