EPIC

EPIC is one of the major and most prestigious non-profit organizations in Australia providing employment services to people marginalized on the labour market. EPIC builds upon its experience of 25 years. With more than 400 staff EPIC assists annually over 10,00 clients who suffer form widest range of disability types and are marginalized on an open labour market. In 2012 EPIC opened its first non-profit subsidiary in Europe that is based in Bratislava. The decision came in response to the experience which EPIC had with a number of organizations in Slovakia. The cooperation focused particularly on issues related to the improvement of employment services and increase of employment of people with disabilities. The collaboration was informal and funded by EPIC. Currently, EPIC, the program of EPIC extensively covers also other target groups and agendas, as inclusion of people living in marginalized Roma communities or disadvantaged youth. EPIC has several programme lines to implement its aims related to the increase of employment and employability of people who are marginalized on an open labour market: 1. Tools for increasing employability of people with disability” – is a project which was testing “Supported Wage System” (Australian model of employing people with disability) to prepare the recommendations for legislative modifications. 2. Support of municipal social enterprise – the ambition of EPIC is to create educational accredited system for municipalities on running social enterprise to create workplaces for marginalised groups. 3. “Job Interview Simulator” – is a project focused on young graduates and their preparation for job interview. Within this project EPIC collaborates with successful companies in Slovakia which train young graduates how to succeed on job interview. 4. Support of international labour mobility – EPIC is a partner organisation of program ERAZMUS+ for young entrepreneurs, which supports exchange of young entrepreneurs to gain knowledge and experience from experienced entrepreneur abroad. 5. Definitely Clean – is a cleaning service run by EPIC to include deaf people into the labour market. Taking part within cleaning service, deaf people have an opportunity to get an extra income. 6. European Voluntary Servise – EPIC has an accreditation for sending young people to abroad´s organisation, enabling young people to gain experience and knowledge from abroad.