Canadian Association for Supported Employment

Innovation Lab

Why Do We Need Innovation?

Despite the great strides made to diversify the nation’s workforce in recent years, many barriers remain. Roughly half of Canadians who experience disability are still unemployed or underemployed. Employers across the country urgently require the skills, education and motivation of this untapped talent pool, but often they do not have access to the tools and resources to make this happen. Innovation is needed to remove the remaining barriers to bring us to the finish line.

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What is an Innovation Lab?

An Innovation Lab is a specialized team within an organization that openly collaborates with stakeholders to address systemic challenges.

CASE’s Innovation Lab was created in 2021 to support, promote and share learnings from synergetic collaborations with partners across the country. The end goal is removing barriers to employment faced by persons experiencing disability.

A grant through the federal government’s Sectoral Initiatives Program (SIP) will support up to 27 projects between now and the fall of 2024. CASE plans to research, select, test, analyse and grow transformative solutions that facilitate the sustained and valued contributions persons experiencing disability make to the Canadian economy.

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Our Partners

Check out the Innovation Lab’s current projects and partners that are piloting transformative solutions that promote full labour market participation for Canadians experiencing disability.
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CASE Course: Nature of Innovation
(Modules 1, 2 & 3)

This course is designed to deepen one’s understanding of the economic and social value of innovation in relation to advancing the inclusion of persons who experience disability within the Canadian workforce.

Module One: Focuses on defining innovation within the field of supported employment, identifying different types of innovation and the associative levels of risk, and exploring the role of Theory of Change in developing innovative products, services or systems.

Module Two: Highlights the key characteristics of innovative cultures and organizations, explores the value of collaborators and partners, and identifies benefits and considerations around innovation in creating a diverse and inclusive workforce.

Module Three: Designed to support organizations in developing an innovation project. Participants in this module will have an opportunity to directly apply the theories and information reviewed in modules one and two. They will also receive tips and strategies for designing each component of their project/proposal.

Sign up now by contacting [email protected] and inquiring about the “Nature of Innovation” course. 

Contact Us!

To learn more or ask any questions about the CASE Innovation Lab, please reach out to:

Sope Ogunrinde

Director - Innovation Lab

Phone: 1-800-684-5628 ext. 720   |   Email[email protected]

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This project is funded by the Government of Canada’s Sectoral Initiatives Program.

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