Centre buzzing with activity
Haley Street woodworking department popular with participants
Participants in the Haley Street Adult Service Centre’s woodworking department are excited to be doing a job where they can see the end result.
“I love making kindling,” said participant Camden MacDonald.”
Participant Dylan Tizzard was quick to add that he loves being part of a team that works hard.
“Everyone has each others backs here, it’s great.”
Fellow participant Jamie Steward said he enjoys working with people who have a great sense of humour.
“I like that we are responsible for making kindling, pellets and grinding sawdust.”
Haley Street Adult Services Centre in North Sydney, a vocational training facility for adults with disabilities, provides valuable opportunities for participants in the woodworking department to work at their own pace.
The department has been a constant source of training and revenue since the centre opened more than three decades ago.
Initially the focus was on refinishing furniture, but over the years people stopped refinishing and started replacing furniture, so it stopped being financially viable.
The woodworking department and its participants then turned their attention to manufacturing picnic tables and garbage bins and went on to make survey stakes and pallets.
The department has since morphed into mainly producing kindling and focusing on recycling sawdust and the manufacturing of wood pellets.
“We really wanted to focus on work that the participants would do independently and as a result we’ve eliminated a lot of the work that required more staff intervention,” explained executive director Debra MacLean.
The centre provides support and programs to 67 adults with disabilities, 15 who are part of the woodworking department.
“A lot of the individuals who work in that department are very motivated to be part of a woodworking program and part of a manufacturing experience.
“We really wanted to focus on work that the participants would do independently and as a result we’ve eliminated a lot of the work that required more staff intervention.” Executive director Debra MacLean.
We are really happy that we are able to keep that department as part of our overall programs,” MacLean said.
“Over the years when we had to make hard decisions about what was economically viable and what wasn’t, we kept coming back to what the individuals in that program were telling us, which was that they like to be part of a production line. They wanted to be in a role where they see an end product. That’s a valuable experience for them in their growth and development.”
Referring to the programs offered at the centre, MacLean said change is constant.
“We are constantly talking and redefining what it is we are doing as a staff to come up with meaningful ways to support the individuals who are part of our programs.”