Welcome to Students Incorporated, a podcast where we dive into relevant topics and issues
related to the world of business, technology, education, and design.
I'm your host, Mr. Jason.
Episodes include student conversations, interviews with thought leaders, and inspirational stories
with an international flavor.
This podcast is created and produced with the help of students from the International
Community School of Bangkok.
In today's episode, we will be discussing the importance of life skills training for
young people.
I'm joined by our special guest, Ms. Mary Kate, a life skills teacher at ICS for part
one.
Part two includes a pre-recorded interview with Mike and Michelle Beard of the MAGA
work from Hanoi, Vietnam.
But before we jump into part one of our episode, let's hear our quote of the day and get some
headline news.
Audre Lorde said, It is not our differences that divide us.
It is our inability to recognize, accept, and celebrate those differences.
Lorde was an esteemed poet, novelist, and professor of English at John Jay College of
Criminal Justice and Hunter College.
As an African American poet, she discussed topics such as race and gender.
Her first volume of poetry, For Cities, was published in 1968.
She was also an essayist, and in her nonfiction work titled The Cancer Journals, she discussed
her own struggles of cancer.
Although she passed away in 1992, she is remembered for her powerful poetry and literary works.
Disney is planning to fire around 7,000 employees from its worldwide staff.
Disney Plus is also losing monthly subscribers as they've only added 200,000 subscribers
in the US and Canada, bringing its total to 46.6 million subscribers.
They plan to reorganize the work structure to reduce costs and be more coordinated.
In East Palestine, Ohio, a 50-car train derailed.
This caused a huge fire and released tons of dangerous chemicals.
Residents were told to evacuate.
There is no information about what caused the accident.
Plenty of the cars contain hazardous materials such as flammables and combustibles.
Fourteen cars contained chemicals and were exposed to fire.
However, at this point, the evacuation order has been lifted.
The Super Bowl drew in 113 million people.
Rihanna's show itself had over 118 million watchers.
15% more than 2022 halftime show.
It was a huge success coming in as the third most watched Super Bowl ever.
Each 30-second commercial cost 7 million and 51 spots were sold.
FC alone dozed out $14 million for two 30-second spots, not including production.
They hired actors Steve Martin and Ben Stiller.
Thank you for the quote in the headline news and we are here for part one to discuss life
skills for all and I'm joined by Pukal who will be saying in as co-host one.
Alright Pukal, can you start us off with our first question?
Yes sir.
So Ms. Mary Kate, can you please introduce yourself and describe your role at the school?
Sure.
So Ms. Mary Kate and I teach elementary life skills so any students K through 5th grade
in the life skills program.
Next question is, why is a life skills program so significant not only for the students participating
but also for the surrounding community?
Great question.
I would say for the students participating it's important because it gives them an opportunity
to be in an inclusive environment which they may not get outside of school.
It creates opportunities for them to learn, develop relationships with peers but for the
surrounding community it is beneficial and significant because it creates more awareness.
I would say I know some students in the elementary they just aren't aware of disabilities or
individuals with disabilities until they're in class with somebody with a disability and
then that creates really awesome conversation about what is a disability, what is this specific
disability and how can we be friends, how can we relate to them.
Learning that they have a lot of things in common with one another.
So that's been really cool to see as are some of my students join their homeroom classes
and develop these friendships and seeing the way that their community in their homeroom
class learns to love them and learns to relate to them and they have this opportunity that
they might not have elsewhere.
How do you think the school best accommodates students in the life skills program?
I think ICS does a great job of allowing students the opportunity to be included in the Gen Ed
program.
So for elementary that's joining a homeroom and going to specials with their homeroom
and middle and high school is going to electives.
Beyond that it's joining academic classes as well so some elementary students are joining
for reading and social studies and science and Bible, they're going to chapel and just
joining their homeroom for as much of the day as possible which I know there are other
programs where it's more of a self-contained classroom so the life skills students are
special ed program is they're just in their classroom all day with their peers who have
disabilities.
I think ICS does a great job of allowing them to be encouraging and allowing them to be
in their homeroom or in the Gen Ed classroom as much as possible throughout the day.
So that's helping with the socialization and then regular other classes and all that
kind of stuff?
Totally, yeah helping with socialization, social skills for sure and yeah just allowing
other students to see that students with disabilities are able and capable of participating in
a lot more than they might assume.
I have one student recently he made a comment of like why isn't so and so in our class
more like he's smart he should be up here more and it was because he had seen him do
a certain math problem and he recognized that this student was able and capable and so that
comments like that are encouraging.
I read recently too that researchers, this was a study I'd read about, researchers
tracked nearly 24,000 adolescents who qualified for special education and they discovered
that spending a majority of the day at least 80% in the general ed class improved reading
scores and math scores by like tremendously compared to the scores of those who were more
in self-contained classrooms and isolated from their peers.
That alone just it not only increases their social skills but it also allows them to grow
academically as well.
And the data is there to prove it right?
Right.
So this is a little bit I know you don't have this question but describe maybe what your
average day looks like.
Sure in the elementary I know it's somewhat similar for middle and high school but for
me it's kind of running all over the place throughout the day.
I have three students in the elementary and they all start their day in their homeroom
classes so that's between two different homerooms a fourth grade and a fifth grade homeroom.
So between my TA and I were up there supporting them in their homeroom and then throughout
the day they're either one will stay up there for Bible and some specials and stuff like
that another will come down and do math and reading with me but throughout the day it's
kind of back and forth between homeroom going to specials and then working individually
with me and when they're down in my classroom it's working on math reading and writing.
Okay the next question then is how have you seen the program develop?
This is only my second year here at ICS so I was able to have a conversation with Miss
Nan and Miss Julia who have been here a little bit longer and they shared that the program
started at with nothing there was no program and then it started as two students in middle
school and then as those students moved up they added in the high school program and
then eventually the elementary program was added.
Started from nothing and now to an elementary middle and high school program.
It's continued to develop to just being able to meet more of students needs having more
staff to support their needs right and the other side of it is the community developing
in awareness and inclusion and just openness to having students with disabilities in their
classroom.
Initially I know in the elementary at least it started out as just students going to specials
and now students are up in homerooms for Bible for reading sometimes science and social studies
so that's a huge development.
I would say also something that Miss Nan and Miss Julia pointed out was that teachers in
the secondary are welcoming the life skills students into their class where I think initially
maybe it felt strange or it felt a little awkward to have life skills students in their
class and they weren't necessarily sure how to teach them how to accommodate them so it's
been really cool to see in across all levels the homeroom teachers and secondary teachers
just welcoming life skills students into their room.
Can you tell us more about the new life skills teachers assistant program and how local students
can sign up for it?
The life skills TA program we're starting to call links program so you can apply to
be a link and that'll be when you register for classes for high school students so when
you apply to for register for classes you can specify TA for the life skills class and
once you do that you'll get a application and once you apply to teachers we'll get
two teacher recommendation forms.
What benefits would the students gain from joining the TA program?
I think just growing in openness and awareness of individuals who are different than you
I think that's a life skill for all people is learning how to relate and work with people
who are different than you and so I think that's a huge skill that all students benefit.
Growing in awareness, openness, empathy as you learn how to interact and relate to individuals
who are different than you.
I think something that was really cool to see is after the first semester we had three
links and they all commented on how just going to that block was a highlight of their day
of how much joy that the life skills students brought to their day.
So I think that is another thing that you gain is just a really fun opportunity to relate
to people to get to know and build relationships but also the joy that they provide you in
your day.
Okay well we're on to our last question and if someone wants to pursue a career in special
education how should they go about doing so and do you have any advice for them?
I would say for ICS students if you are thinking about pursuing a career in special ed becoming
a link or a life skills TA would be a great opportunity to see if that's something that
you're really passionate about.
It gives you a great opportunity to be in the classroom or go to different classes with
the life skills students.
I think also finding opportunities to volunteer and work with individuals with disabilities
outside of school if that's something you're thinking about just to get that experience
and then going forward in university finding a school or a university that has a program
for special education.
Yeah advice for students who are looking to pursue special education but also just advice
for individuals in general I would say is the idea of presuming intelligence not looking
at individuals with disabilities and assuming that they're not able or not capable.
I think that's oftentimes when we yeah we're proved wrong the most is when we think like
oh they are going to need extra support in this or they're going to just because they
can't communicate what they're thinking or can't communicate what they need right now
they must not be smart and so I think that would be the biggest piece of advice for anybody
pursuing special ed or life skills or just in general is viewing each individual whether
they have a disability or not as able and capable because oftentimes they're a lot smarter
than we often assume.
So yeah having that mindset going into working with life skills students here at ICS but
also just in general.
Okay and with that we'll be right back with the short PSA but if you're interested in
links and you're here at ICS check it out it's a great new program.
Speaking of diversity International Day is right around the corner.
This is the day that ICS celebrates its very own diversity.
ICS has over 22 countries represented in its student body.
There will be amazing food music and games at the after school event along with the show
featuring dances and acts representing the countries.
Represent your country by wearing traditional clothes during the school day on February
24th.
We are back for part two of our episode that's focused on the topic of life skills.
Life skills also include vocational training.
Previously I was able to sit down with my business partner and his wife to discuss a
social enterprise they started in Hanoi Vietnam.
The following conversation was recorded on one of my trips to visit them.
All right could you introduce yourselves and then explain the vision behind Imago work.
Sure my name is Mike and I'm here with my wife Michelle.
We've been in Hanoi for 12 years and I've been friends with Jason for a long time and
I'm also Jason's business partner in Vietnam.
We started Simple Coffee here a few years ago and that was a few years after Jason started
in Bangkok.
Imago work is a vocational training program for young adults that are 16 and above that
have cognitive disabilities.
Yeah the vision for this really kind of comes from our own personal experience of having
a son who has special needs or son Evan.
He's 26 this year and he has Down syndrome.
And when Mike and Jason and Julie opened up Simple Coffee in Vietnam we invited our son
Evan who had had an opportunity to study vocational training in the U.S.
We invited him to come back and work with us in this coffee shop and we just saw how
much life it brought to him and just kind of this sense of purpose, sense of dignity.
And we thought you know what we would love to do this for more young people not just
Evan.
And so we as we've been meeting families living here in Vietnam that are similar to ours we
started to yeah just catch this vision for how we could help other young people like
Evan go to work.
I really like the meaning and vision behind Imago work.
Maybe you can give a little information about how you came up with the word Imago.
Imago work actually comes from the phrase Imado Dei.
So that's a Latin phrase that means image of God.
And so it comes from our own faith background which is this which is the sense that all
humans are created in the image of the creator that they're brought into this world with
special gifts and talents and abilities and they are meant to use those gifts to contribute
to our world and to make our world a better place.
And so we need these gifts.
We need these young people to be using their gifts.
And so when you go to work that's one way that you show that image.
And so it's just this way that we can really instill dignity in young people who often
are kind of on the margins often are not welcomed or included and don't have a lot of opportunities
for work.
And so we thought well this is a great name for the program.
Imago work.
I really like that.
I'm sure some of our listeners would love to hear about some of the workplace initiatives
you've been promoting through this program.
So maybe you can explain some of those initiatives are some of your partnerships with partner
businesses as well as some of the training as well.
Yeah so actually the inspiration for Imago work and the idea first comes from Thailand.
Actually we met Max Simpson who is who runs Steps with Tira in Bangkok.
So that's where we first saw this model of training in a vocational training center for
one to two years and then partnering with local businesses within our city to create
jobs within these businesses.
So we are in our third year of operation in Hanoi and we currently have about five different
partner businesses in the city.
So we work with places like Intercontinental Hotel of course Simple Coffee other coffee
shops like Joma Bakery and Horaberry Coffee.
We're just now beginning some partnerships with international schools such as the United
Nations International School.
So what we do is we go to these companies and we just share with them this vision and
we say hey you know we have some great young people who are looking for work would you
consider opening up some jobs for them.
And so they get creative and look for different types of jobs that would be suitable for students
like our students.
So what kind of training do you actually do within the program?
I know there's different like elements or different segments and there's specific things
you've trained them for in the workplace so maybe you can explain some of that too.
Yeah so there's we train in three basic areas.
A lot of our students are trying to develop skills that will help them with sort of their
basic life and just living skills and so we provide training with basic life skills and
then we provide training with social skills.
Some of our students struggle in the area of communication and connecting with other people
and so we provide some training in that area.
And then the third area would be vocational skills so these would be practical job skills
and we are just identify the skills that you need in the workplace and we break those skills
down into individual steps and basically help our students learn how to like make a make
a cup of coffee or clean a window or serve a customer.
But we think about these things and then we think about what are all the individual pieces
that go into making a cup of coffee and then breaking it down into those individual steps.
I know there are challenges obviously in working in business and hiring and also training but
within your program maybe you can explain or tell us what are some of the challenges
you face with this type of work and specifically about when you get some of your trainees ready
and then release them into certain businesses what does that kind of look like?
Yeah there's a few different challenges.
I think for us like I was talking about with the training is making sure that we're providing
training that is individualized to the needs of our students and so that can be a challenge
because some of the students might have challenges in one area or other students have challenges
in another area and trying to create a training program that accommodates for all of the different
individual needs at times can be challenging.
It's not impossible obviously but it's something that we constantly are revising and then I
think probably but bigger than that the biggest challenge that we face is just the attitudes
in society when we're approaching people about this they tend to think of it first in terms
of charity how can we help people with these cognitive differences and we try to approach
it in a way where we're encouraging people that it's not about just helping them but
it's also about allowing these young adults to access their gifts and their talents and
be able to bring those gifts and talents into the workplace because they do have a lot to
bring to the workplace and so part of the challenge is showing businesses what those
benefits are and how they can benefit from these students being in the workplace.
And my next question is how have your participants responded to the training it seems like there's
been a great positive response but maybe you can speak specifically about some of the individuals
that you've been working with and some of the growth that you've seen in them.
What they love is just this idea that they are going into training and they're being
trained to go to work and for many of them you know they just haven't had that experience
before and so it's already just exciting it's exciting to come in and be able to learn how
to operate an espresso machine learn how to fraud milk and these are things that they
often see in a coffee shop but then for them to get to try it and step by step become more
confident it's very exciting. One of our first trainees his name is Zwi and he has Down
Syndrome just like our son Eben. I remember them showing up at Imago one day and his dad
saying you know we have a vision for our son to be able to go to work and so it was neat
to see Zwi come from knowing not a single thing about how to pull a shot or how to fraud
milk and then over the time of him being in our program be able to make all the different
kind of coffee drinks that you can make in a coffee shop and then what's very exciting
is that now he is in a really great internship at Intercontinental Hotel where he works he
gets to work in the bakery and he is part of that team he goes every day and works on
doing different things with packaging their cakes and their pastries. Probably the best
part of it though is because you know as we started there they didn't really know him
and I think the staff there were also like not sure how they're gonna work with him but
now that he's been in there over a year he's part of their team and so they're excited
to have him and they love him and so I think that's that's what we want to see you know
it's not just us training them and then getting them the job but then seeing the staff in
the workplace environment feel confident and excited to have someone like Zwi on their
team. And one thing that I would add to that too is that the type of students that we work
with they've been labeled disabled and so because they have that label people tend to
approach them with the attitude of how can I help this person what can I do for this
person and through a MAGA work they're able to to sort of move out of that environment
of receiving and get to a place where they can now actually contribute to to the workplace
contribute to the community and that really does a lot for their own personal sense of
dignity because instead of just being on the receiving end of things they can now use their
gifts and they can use their talents and they can bring that into the community and and
have it be something that benefits you know the the workplace that they're in.
Let me move on to our final question as we're running out of time but this kind of is similar
to the previous question but what are some of those special things that you see that
make this type of work worth it. I know it's hard work and I've seen how hard it is and
but maybe you can talk about some of those things that you see personally as well as
maybe in participants but also in some of those businesses that just make going and
doing this every day worth it for you. I think for me we can both answer this I think
what makes it worth it is just being able to see other people have a changed mindset
you know so for example we have volunteers that come every week and they spend time in
our social skills club and in the beginning they feel nervous they don't know how to even
like talk to somebody that is different and they feel really kind of unsure but then it's
just fun to see over you know a few weeks how those relationships become like normal
friendships for our peer mentors when they come in they all of a sudden don't even pay
attention to the disability but it just seems like a normal friendship to them so I think
that's what I like seeing that happen in this friendship relationship and then in the workplace
too just that they have just these normal relationships they don't notice the differences
anymore. Yeah and as a as a business owner for Simple Coffee we have part of the training
program is that the students come down into the coffee shop where they can get some experience
and what's really cool about that and what's worth it for me isn't so much the experience
that they get as the students but the fact that they have an impact on our staff and
our staff just by interacting with our students it changes their perception of what disability
is it changes their perception of maybe somebody with autism and Down syndrome that they didn't
know how to interact with but then just by working with them in the coffee shop now they
feel more comfortable and so that for me is very much worth it. Okay actually I have one
more question we always want to end with asking the question about if you were to give advice
to our listeners what advice would you give? Sure yeah so from a business standpoint when
we often think about diversity in the workplace what comes to our mind most immediately is
probably like ethnicity or skin color or gender you know when we think about a diverse workplace
we think of people from different ethnic backgrounds and and people from representing different
genders right? Also realizing that diversity has to do with more than just that it has
to do with like people's physical abilities people's intellectual abilities and so recognizing
that a workplace for it to be truly diverse it needs to have people that are that have
physical challenges or that have intellectual challenges or developmental challenges having
those people in the workplace helps to create diversity. My advice is just to everyone in
general as a mom who has a child with special needs I think it is so amazing that he can
have his own friends and he can have a social life and so I really encourage you if you
don't have someone like that in your life if you don't know someone with Down syndrome
or autism or other types of cognitive differences then I would really encourage you to go find
a place where you can interact where you can meet them and make friends with them and like
as Mike said not like in a pity way but in a way that your life is going to be so enriched
by these relationships and so I just think that that is just a great thing to do. As
we end this episode we'd like to thank our guests for joining it has been a pleasure
to have you on the podcast our next episode is going to be AI related featuring a new
language model this podcast would not be possible without the hard work and support of our international
student production team. All music and sound effects are a courtesy of Pixabay.com a vibrant
community of creatives sharing copyright free images videos and music and we are signing
off until next time we're students incorporated because your voice matters.