Canadian National Institute of the Blind

Purpose

The Canadian National Institute of the Blind (CNIB) plans to offer young Canadians with sight loss or blindness, sensory disability, or print and perceptual disability, three-month long internships in a Caribbean country. A total of 80 placements will offer targeted youth the opportunity to work will local established charitable advocacy or service provision organizations focusing on inclusivity, diversity, and equity initiatives within their respective region, with specific emphasis on serving the blindness populations in their countries. Proposed activities will be related to service delivery in rehabilitation; global health; public policy; health initiative programs; and social inclusion programs. Through the project, CNIB will provide resources, training, and support to empower youth with disabilities to enter and thrive in the workforce; guide interns on mitigation approaches to various barriers that they may encounter in the workforce (physical or discriminatory); and aspire to prepare participating youth for positions of leadership and representation. Throughout the negotiation phase, the organization will be encouraged to add specific details on the GE barriers experienced by Canadian Youth with sight loss or blindness, sensory disabilities, or print and perceptual disabilities in gaining meaningful employment. We will also suggest they provide sensitization to the Canadian public during post-internship activities, on the intersectional employment barriers based on gender, sex, and sexual identities for target demographic and host country experience as well as ensure sufficient disaggregation of indicators to account for specified intersecting identities and include sex, gender/and age, where possible.