Deaf Unity has become the first deaf organisation to be nominated for an award at the annual Chartered Institute of Personnel Development People Awards at the Grosvenor Hotel in Park Lane, London. The Awards recognise outstanding achievements within the Human Resources Profession and Deaf Unity is no exception. The deaf community can demonstrate professional standards comparable to their hearing peers.
We are pleased and grateful for CIPD’s recognition of the work that Deaf Unity is making towards promoting diversity within the human resources profession. This reflects Deaf Unity’s desire to engage with both the deaf community and the profession to tackle the chronic under and unemployment of the deaf community, which stands at a rate of 1:4 compared with 1:10 for the mainstream population according to the UK Council on Deafness. And they recognised Deaf Unity’s excellent strengths in its innovative out-of-the-box thinking and partnership-working activities worldwide.
Alasdair Grant, Deaf Unity’s Deaf Alumni Project Manager said: “I was excited to have represented Deaf Unity at the Awards Ceremony on what was an exciting evening for the deaf community and to make many new contacts to support Deaf Unity’s work. I met the Chief Executive of Crossrail. The fact that many people cheered when Deaf Unity’s name was mentioned at the Awards as a nominee, emphasises the willingness of many employers to engage with the deaf community to tackle the chronic unemployment of the community. A couple of other nominees wanted to hold meetings with Deaf Unity on partnership working and were very excited about Deaf Unity’s future plans for the deaf community”.
Our Deaf Alumni project encompasses a range of activities on top of the first Deaf Careers Fair to tackle those challenges. For example, the first Deaf Friendly Model United Nations Conference organised in partnership with Oxford Model United Nations Society (see link to MUN Conference). In order to make those activities a success, Deaf Unity needs the engagement and support of both the Deaf Community and employers. There are many more exciting activities planned in the pipeline and to come – watch this space on the Alumni Project.
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