Dream comes true for disabled mother
|Published
Cindy Klaas, 34 a disabled woman has secured a learnership through Altitude Workforce Solutions. During this one year period, Klaas will earn a stipend after which she will seek to find employment. Picture: Tracey Adams/African News Agency (ANA) Cindy Klaas, 34 a disabled woman has secured a learnership through Altitude Workforce Solutions. During this one year period, Klaas will earn a stipend after which she will seek to find employment. Picture: Tracey Adams/African News Agency (ANA)
Cape Town - Her smile says it all. Her Christmas wish has been granted and a new life awaits wheelchair-bound Cindy Klaas and her daughter after her story appeared in the Cape Argus recently.
Klaas, 34, got a learnership and a salary after almost five years of struggling in a wheelchair.
“After my story was in the paper I received a call to go to Altitude Group for an interview,” explained Klaas.
That same day she received news that she was accepted in their skills development programme on a one-year paid learnership. “I’m so happy; my life has started,” she said, adding that the first thing she did when she left the interview was call her daughter.
Klaas is already looking for a house where they can start over again.
She became disabled aged 30 and lost her job and home. With a disability grant of only R1780 she couldn’t afford a living for her and her
daughter.
She decided to leave her daughter with a relative who offered support. Klaas went to stay at a friend’s house. She will start the learnership in January, and in February she will be assigned a workplace.
Cindy Klaas, 34 a disabled woman has secured a learnership through Altitude Workforce Solutions. During this one year period, Klaas will earn a stipend after which she will seek to find employment. Picture: Tracey Adams/African News Agency (ANA)
“I’m so ready for it,” she said.
Altitude Skills managing director of skills development Shanaaz Abdol explained that their job was to take people with disabilities into learnerships and raise awareness among companies over employment opportunities. “Cindy will learn skills for reception, secretary work and administration tasks. At some point we will transfer her over to the employment division. Learners can spend up to three years in the programme and then be employed.
“We are running about 156 learnerships at the moment and our rate of success for the past 15 years is that about 85% of them get employed,” he added.
However, there are some criteria to enter the programme, such as having completed Grade 11 and the ability to speak English and Afrikaans.
Abdol recognised that companies like Altitude Skills still faced discrimination. “There’s still a huge lack of knowledge and awareness. Many companies are willing to listen and learn, but there are many more that don’t know how to employ them, and that’s our job,” he said.
@TheCapeArgus
paula.andres@inl.co.za