In Mount Mercy College Transition Year students take part in a Community Work Placement for one week and a Work Experience Programme for two weeks.

Community Work Placement

Community Work is an integral part of the Transition Year Programme at Mount Mercy College. It assists and encourages our students to live out the core values of CEIST. It creates an awareness of the needs of those who are disadvantaged by disability, health or life circumstances. Placements are usually scheduled for the week prior to the October midterm.

Aims

Community work gives Transition Year students a chance to play a real part in the community and become involved in voluntary community activities. The Community Experience encourages students to look beyond themselves to individuals and organisations which cater for those in need. For most students it is their very first introduction to the workplace.

Work Experience Programme

One of the main aims of Transition Year is to create opportunities to vary the learning environment. incorporated into this, is an orientation towards the world of work. Our work experience programme is an integral part of an education for working life and in addition to giving students an insight into the world of work, it provides them with opportunities for developing their social and life skills

Students are informed in September of the dates that their work experience programme will be held and given a briefing on what is involved to allow them to begin organisation of their placement. The work experience coordinators meet with all Transition Year students to begin preparations for their placement. At this session students are given a work experience information pack. Subsequent to this meeting students have an adequate time frame to organise their placements.

During the two weeks of their placements all students are visited or contacted by teachers of the school. The teacher completes a report form documenting various particulars including any issues raised by students or employers. This is then returned to the co-ordinators who correlate all the reports and then do an overall evaluation of the placements of that year.