TEAM Project - Offenbach

Nassauische Heimstätte has been involved for many years in the youth project, T.E.A.M. – Ticket zur Einmündung in den Arbeits-Markt (Ticket for Flow into the Work Market) for
young people, 17 to 25 years of age, who have not graduated from high school or do not have an apprenticeship trainee position.

Every year the project offers ten young people the opportunity to complete a qualification year as a painter. Counseled socially and educationally, the young people gain social skills as well as basic trade skills – and can maintain themselves better in the labor market.

The project goals are an improvement in the opportunities in the job market for disadvantaged young people, an increase in quality of life in the housing developments of the project partners through renovation and other measures in the neighborhood as well as a consolidation of resident identification with their neighborhood in the housing estates and through this, limitation of vandalism.

Since 1994, Nassauische Heimstätte has carried out this youth project together with the city of Offenbach. A painter especially engaged by the cooperation partner, Internationale Bund,  expertly instructs the young people and explains that work is more than removing carpets and sweeping floors. That work is not primarily constraint and pressure, but is understood as an opportunity to stand on one’s own feet financially and to lead a self-determined life to a certain degree.

As the first hurdle, the young people must pass a six week long practicum – whoever does not accept the rules cannot participate in the project. In the subsequent work year, they must prove that they can pitch in and work constructively. They are at the building site four days a week, 6.5 hours a day – quite a number even find employment or a training position before the end of the year.

This social project costs Nassauische Heimstätte around 60,000 euros. In addition to a social education worker from the city of Offenbach, Project Director Ingrid Kehr, the project is also supervised by Prof. Wilhelm Kahl of the Frankfurt Technical High School. As a volunteer, he develops new ideas and brings his expert knowledge to the topic of „social work“.

Contact person:
Sascha Langknecht
Tel. 069 6069-1481
Mail: sascha.langknecht@naheimst.de