Cooperation between Ringkøbing-Skjern municipality, local businesses and UCplus ensures Ukrainian refugees a good start in Denmark
Together with Ringkøbing-Skjern Municipality, the UCplus Language School has created a special offer for newly relocated Ukrainian citizens, where Danish lessons are spiced up with visits to local businesses. It is a win-win situation for all parties. The Ukrainian citizens want jobs, the local companies need labour, and UCplus helps the Ukrainians learn Danish so that they can get to work quickly.
The Ukrainian citizens who learn Danish at UCplus would very much like to have a job. So there were happy faces when UCplus took them on a visit to a local fishery company and a holiday home rental company.
UCplus offers job-related Danish lessons
The collaboration between UCplus and Ringkøbing-Skjern Municipality has come about because the municipality wanted an educational offer targeted at the labour market in and around Ringkøbing-Skjern Municipality.
“It is important to give the Ukrainian refugees a good start in Denmark, and when we collaborate with both the municipality and the local businesses, we create the best conditions for them to be integrated quickly,” says Language Center Manager Karen Poulsen.
Another important prerequisite is that the Ukrainian citizens receive job-related Danish lessons. And UCplus’ language consultants make sure of that.
“We make a great effort to ensure that the Danish that we teach is job-related. This means that we put focus on the vocabulary and grammar the Ukrainians will need to get by in a Danish workplace. We also explain how the Danish labour market works, for example why we pay tax, and how to understand a pay slip,” says language consultant Annemette Knudsen.
Holiday home rental company and fishing businesses open their doors
In addition to the Danish lessons, the Ukrainians have also visited a few of the local companies that need extra hands, e.g. Esmark Feriehusudlejning and the fishing company Insula.
At Esmark Feriehusudlejning, HR assistant, Stephanie Dittrich, is happy to be able to open the doors to the Ukrainian immigrants.
“Esmark has 3.800 holiday homes, and we have a great need for cleaning assistants. So it was obvious for us to invite the Ukranians to our new office buildings here in Hvide Sande. We can give an impression of which tasks a cleaning assistant has and we can show them how things work here, eg. that they get good work clothes. Some of our holiday homes are located directly opposite the office. You can easily walk or cycle to the holiday homes, and we can therefore show them that transport is not a problem if they are hired by us.”
It is not the first time that Esmark Ferieudlejning employs Ukrainians.
“We already have a number of employees who are from Ukraine. They arrived 4-5 years ago, i.e. before the war in Ukraine, and they are well established here in the area. They are therefore a great help, and make it much easier for us to help the new Ukrainians get going with us.”
After the company visits, the Ukrainians were taught how to write job applications, and Annemette Knudsen then went out with the Ukrainians to hand in the applications.
Cooperation between UCplus and the Ringkøbing-Skjern Municipality will continue until July 2023
The collaboration between UCplus and Ringkøbing-Skjern municipality regarding the education of the Ukrainian newcomers was originally planned to end mid-December 2022. But the municipality is extremely satisfied with the course and activities provided by UCplus, and the municipality has therefore chosen to extend the collaboration until June 2023.
Want to know more?
If you want to know more about the collaboration between UCplus and Ringkøbing-Skjern municipality and the possibility of getting a specially tailored Danish course, contact Language Center Manager Karen Poulsen at kp@ucplus.dk or call 31 12 03 67.
And you can read more about UCplus many Danish courses here