At the July, 2018 SEARCH International Conference, four of Minnesota's Project SEARCH sites received employment outcome awards.
| Site | Award |
|---|---|
| Mayo | 100% |
| Children's Minnesota | 80-89% |
| State of Minnesota | 80-89% |
| Medtronic | 80-89% |
This is quite an accomplishment for our Minnesota sites and a great example of the truly collaborative work that is happening between all of our agencies at both the state and local level, and local businesses. Minnesota businesses who have been host sites for Project SEARCH have access to a new, diverse, talent pool.
Medtronic is a global healthcare solutions company committed to improving the lives of people through our medical technologies, services, and solutions.
Manufacturing: ATS Plymouth Heart Valve Internships – Work tasks include inspection, grinding, blasting, sanding, cleanroom, parts/carbon pulling, and inventory
Brooklyn Park Perfusion Systems – Clean room assembly, materials handler, warehouse handler, repack center, packaging, quality control, electronics
Manufacturing: Medtronic Energy Component Center (MECC) – Dry room battery inspecting and laser marking, packaging, materials handler and replenishment
Nathan Lane Facility – Clean room assembly, inspecting, packaging, marking, office work
Rice Creek – Pharma lab, calibration
Office Administration
ITS Technical User Support
Children's Minnesota is one of the largest freestanding pediatric health systems in the United States—with two hospitals, 12 primary care clinics and six rehabilitation and nine specialty care sites. It is the only health system and Level I Trauma Center in Minnesota to provide care exclusively to children from before birth through young adulthood. Children's Minnesota is an award-winning health system, regularly ranked by U.S. News & World Report as a top children's hospital.
Watch Project Search at Children's on Vimeo.Children's Minnesota has collaborated with Minneapolis Public Schools Transition Plus program for 8 years. A licensed special education teacher/work coordinator and skills trainers lead the Project SEARCH team. Student interns have opportunities to work in various departments. Children's Minnesota is the recipient of national awards for graduates achieving 80-89% paid competitive employment.
| 2012 - 80% | 2015 - 80% | 2016 - 80% | 2017 - 80% |
Nutrition Services
Supply Chain
Child Life
Environmental Services
Infant Care Center
Respiratory Therapy
Neonatal Intensive Care Unit
PICU
Environmental Services Audit Bundle
PROJECT SEARCH – AVERA MARSHALL Web Site
Avera Marshall Regional Medical Center is part of the Avera system of care. Avera encompasses 300 locations in 97 communities in a five-state region. The Avera brand represents system strength and local presence, compassionate care and a Christian mission, clinical excellence, technological sophistication, an array of specialty care and industry leadership.
Dietary
Clerical: Includes several departments, a combination of departments including Organizational Excellence, POB Mail, LTC Mail, Home Medical, Big Stone Therapy, Medical Records
Health Services: includes several department areas and combination of departments determined with intern by their career interests.
Same Day Surgery
Hospital: Med/Surg. and OB
Program Services LTC
Primary Care
Environmental Services: Housekeeping
Environmental Services: Laundry
*(determined by skills of intern)
Maintenance
Material Distribution
Thrift Store
Fairview Lakes Medical Center provides award-winning care to the communities northeast of the Twin Cities. They are a Level IV trauma center, providing life-saving treatment to the seriously ill and injured 24 hours a day. Specialty services are available on-site in heart care, cancer care, childbirth, orthopedics, pediatrics and more.
Millcarts – The intern works in the MedSurge & ICU Department, restocking medical supplies into the patient carts. This job has a lot of repetition but has a need for good communication skills, as patient/nurse interactions happen all day.
Facilities Assistant – This position is in charge of delivering oxygen/CO2/ tanks to eight different locations daily and replacing empty tanks. They work with the facilities department to help with fixing hospital equipment, outdoor maintenance, indoor maintenance, organization, side by side assistance, etc.
Store Keeper/Supply Chain – This position is in charge of restocking medical supplies in up to 4 departments and checking expiration dates monthly, this position requires consistency in product identification and shelving.
Nutrition Services – Students learn how to run the dishwasher and put them away on the drying rack, do breakfast trays, make sandwiches, assist the baker, assist the head cook, work in the cafeteria stocking the supplies, run the pizza over, stock the salad bar, etc.
Environmental Services – This internship has several levels of opportunities. Interns start with learning basic cleaning and disinfecting skills and move into more independent level. An intern could express an interest in cleaning patient rooms and team up with a Fairview employee.
Security – In charge of creating employee badges, walking the parking lot patrol contractor access lost and found recovery, hourly rounds and answering security office phones (when needed). Interns will learn how to determine the urgency of the supervisor being called as well as problem solving.
Clerical – This position sorting and delivering mail and packages to most of the clinics. This position includes light cleaning, placing conference room schedules for the day, and delivering copy paper to different departments. Patient room restocking is another task that is looking at being added.
Gillette Children's Specialty Healthcare is the nation's first hospital serving children who have disabilities. Gillette concentrates on delivering effective treatments to a defined patient population—children who have complex disabilities, rare conditions and traumatic injuries.
Our care is organized around patients' most common conditions, including cerebral palsy, neurological disorders, craniofacial issues, orthopedic problems, brain and spinal cord injury, and neuromuscular challenges.
Our specialized focus means we've learned more about these complex conditions than many other hospitals. We're committed to using our knowledge to advance treatments and research that improves our patients' lives.
At Gillette, we firmly believe that a child's ability is far stronger than any disability. We believe that children can achieve their goals—and their dreams—when we provide the transformative care that helps them thrive. We believe that the concept of "CAN" is far stronger than "can't."
Gillette Children's Specialty Healthcare departments are currently providing Project SEARCH internship opportunities in:
All students have the support of the Project SEARCH Instructor and Skills Trainer to learn new skills and increase independence.
Hennepin Healthcare is:
Hennepin Healthcare Project SEARCH site provides an innovative workforce and career development model with a goal for interns to increase their independence, confidence, job skills and become competitively employed. Interns are assigned three separate ten week rotations during the school year. These rotations are in departments throughout the hospital allowing for development of a variety of social, emotional and job skills through real work experiences.
Mayo Clinic provides the highest quality patient care by placing the needs of the patients first. At Mayo Clinic, you'll discover a culture of teamwork, professionalism and mutual respect. Mayo Clinic is committed to creating a caring service environment while ensuring that individual differences are valued at every level of the organization. Our mission is to be recognized by patients, employees, peer institutions and the community as the leading model for diversity and inclusion.
Mayo Clinic in Rochester is celebrating its first anniversary with Project SEARCH. From the perspectives and experiences of many people, particularly the young adults who had the opportunity to work there as interns, this has been a very successful year.
"I learned new skills and how to work as a team;"
"Motivated and succeeding and, for the first time, seeing something worth working hard at."
As a result, the program will be expanded this next year.
There are over 50,000 forms within the Mayo Clinic Health System, each requiring a MCHS number. Interns can be found at the computer working with spreadsheets and excel forms, assigning hundreds of the forms numbers, and saving them as a pdf. They complete projects for multiple departments within the Mayo Clinic System. Interns also work in the Print Shop assembling DVD's for patient education and training.
Interns assist patients with their trays, stock and straighten coolers, wipe tray slides and sneeze guards, and keep the dining area in the cafeteria "cleaner than it's ever been"!
Due to the highly regulated and controlled environment, interns receive additional training and learn the protocols for preparing materials for use in animal research. They roll gowns, stock supplies, and operate the autoclave. Interns look forward to the days they spend time caring for the animals by providing enrichment activities.
This is the most visible of the internships. Hundreds of people pass every day while the interns are cleaning sections of the two main buildings on the Downtown Campus. Five of the six entries into the buildings are cleaned. Glass has become our "friend" as we address the never-ending challenge of wiping the fingerprints from the balcony after the many musical performances in the courtyard. Interns continue to discover additional areas to add to their routine as they receive the "thanks" of visiting patients and families.
Biobank has reached its goal! 50,000 participants have consented to provide a blood sample and complete the questionnaire contributing to DNA and other research. Interns continue to send out hundreds of enrollment packets to increase the number. They place a label on each insert in an enrollment packet which is addressed to a specific patient. Accuracy is critical and our interns maintain their focus to meet the high standards!
The Project SEARCH interns understand the significance of their daily contributions as part of the Mayo Clinic family where every act reflects,"…the needs of the patient comes first".
Janitorial – Maintain restrooms and common areas. Tasks include replacing paper products, wiping counters, emptying trash, mopping and vacuuming.
Groundskeeping – Maintain exterior grounds. Tasks include mowing, weed whipping, edging, raking, planting, weeding, snow removal, trash and recycling collection, deliveries, maintaining machinery and more.
Central Mail – Process outgoing mail. Tasks include assist on the postage machine by bundling mail, affix postage and labels on special mailings, process mail using postage machine, mail individual boxes/packages by entering in shipping information and affixing label and other projects as able.
Food Service – Cafeteria assistant/Food prep. Tasks include restocking beverage coolers, prepping food, grill, maintain cafeteria tables, refill utensils and condiments, empty trash and recycling and other tasks as able.
Governor's Office – Tasks include checking and ordering supplies, maintaining copier paper levels, scanning and renaming documents, copying and documenting policy mail, e-mailing, shredding, labeling, special projects and more.
Beyond the Yellow Ribbon – Tasks include preparing interview and service packets, making phone calls, gathering materials for representatives, research military actions of the day in certain countries, attend off-site presentations and other tasks as assigned.
Department of Employment and Economic Development (DEED) – Reception, data entry, sorting mail, and scanning.
Department of Human Services (DHS) – Application processor. Tasks include sorting, scanning, data entry, filing and purging I-9 and other employment documents using SEMA4 and other programs. Assist with preparing, folding, sending, and data entry of survey results.
Historical Society – Read scanned images, combine PDF's and name groupings, re-folder prison records, identify and tag donated 3D objects for storage and/or display, and making book bindings from excess materials.
Military Affairs – Personnel file archiver. Tasks include redacting social security numbers within personnel file, scanning and processing of retired military files.
Secretary of States Office – Digital documenting. Tasks include sorting documents by type (30+ different document types), scanning and entering data into the database for public review. Pulling files older than one year, preparing archives and special projects as assigned.
Veterans Services – Application entry. Tasks include marking the Applicants County, scanning, entering information into two databases, creating packets, processing letters, filing, sending out processed document, entering in payment information and other special projects.
MN IT Services – Inventory, reimage computers, sort pictures and label electronically, set up computer stations, help desk and more.