A GROUP of nine Project SEARCH interns at Musgrove Park Hospital have celebrated their graduation at an awards evening.

The scheme is a one-year course for young people with special educational needs and disabilities in their final year of education.

It enables them to work at Musgrove to gain the skills, experience, knowledge and confidence needed to move into work.

Maria Nicholls, job coach at Project SEARCH, said: "It has gone really well, with all of our nine interns successfully placed across 17 different departments at the hospital.

“We had so many new departments come on board and every one of them accepted our interns into their team and embraced Project SEARCH.

“For the first time ever, we were able to offer placements in our dental laboratory, audiology department, goods-in area, Wordsworth ward, Jubilee Building dishwashing area, children’s unit, maintenance department, and the Somerset Larder restaurant."

So far, five of them have secured paid employment and efforts are underway to find jobs for the others.

Hayley Peters, chief nurse at Somerset NHS Foundation Trust, which runs the hospital, said the interns have done valuable jobs in helping the running of the hospital.

She added: "Our Project SEARCH interns have been so well received in all of the 17 departments, and the overall feedback I’ve heard from colleagues is that they’ve benefited as much as the interns have.

“The awards evening was so emotional and is always the highlight of my year.

"I am so proud of the amazing achievements of our interns, as well as the way our colleagues support people of different backgrounds to thrive."