Madrid | April 09, 2017
The Community of Madrid, through the General Directorate of Pre-school, Primary and Secondary Education, has launched for the tenth consecutive year the 4th ESO+Enterprise program "with the aim of bringing the educational system and the world of work closer together, facilitating through educational stays in companies and institutions that young people are better prepared to make decisions about their academic and professional future", according to the description of the project on its website.
Through this initiative, students in the fourth year of ESO can voluntarily spend between three and five school days at public or private organizations to learn first-hand about the activities carried out by the professionals who work there.
Envera wanted to join the 4th ESO+Enterprise project in collaboration with the Raimundo Lulio School and the Nuestra Señora de las Nieves School, hosting for three days two students, Raquel and Elena, from the former, and a student, Alberto, from the latter.
Laura, a 4th year ESO student in the scientific field, already knew Envera before starting her educational stay at the Training Service. Radio Terrícola, a therapeutic workshop carried out by the beneficiaries of the Envera Occupational Center, participated with its mobile unit in the Scientific Days promoted by Raimundo Lulio the previous year. However, she wanted to know more about the work done with people with disabilities, which motivated her to choose this entity as her center to participate in the program.
Alberto, 16, came to Envera with the intention of "learning about people with disabilities, being at ease and enjoying" the opportunity he was given. At the end of his stay, he acknowledged that this had been the case. Like Laura, Alberto participated in the training programs. Both shared the classroom and activities with Envera's students, having the opportunity, with the support of the teachers, to put into practice dynamics they had prepared themselves.
For her part, Raquel spent her educational stay at the Envera Special Employment Center in Madrid, interested in the work performed by people with disabilities. With them, she checked, as one of the team, the handling tasks that are done in Envera, where protected and stable employment is provided to half a thousand people with disabilities. Raquel has only words of praise for her colleagues: "they are attentive, good people and lead a normal life, like everyone else".
Raquel has it clear after her stay at Envera: regardless of her occupation in the future, she would like to participate in volunteer actions to make a fairer society where we all have the same opportunities.
Last year, 14,560 students from Madrid participated in this program and 6,359 institutions hosted educational stays. For Envera, being part of 4º ESO+Empresa means continuing to make disability visible and normalize it, breaking down prejudices, especially among young people, and bringing the educational environment closer to the daily lives of people with disabilities, showing that we can all be the best at something.
