Adults From Saint Catherine Center Help Town Hall With Shredding

FAIRFIELD – What is shredding for some is an opportunity for others. Adult participants from Saint Catherine Center for Special Needs welcomed the opportunity to assist the Fairfield Probate Court with some of its document shredding. Two program participants, Ryan Rajkowski of New Canaan and Patrick Ross of Fairfield, recently visited Sullivan Independence Hall with Center staff to pick up approximately 15 banker’s boxes of old, non-confidential documents which the 25 adults at the Center will shred.

Shredding requires dexterity, sorting skills, and patience—all skills that the adults at Saint Catherine Center have practiced over the past year while they have been confined to onsite vocational experiences due to the pandemic. In a normal year, students and adults from the Center would be out in the community every day, performing tasks such as stacking pots at Gilbertie’s, sorting clothes at Marshalls, and other sites where the Center has an arrangement for vocational experiences.

“Shredding is one activity everyone can do, and it can be done onsite,” said Brady Cronin, Director of the Adult Program. “All of our adult rooms have shredders. I think we’ll make pretty short work of it. We’ve got a good crew!”

Diane Auray, Chief Clerk for the Fairfield Probate Court and a Saint Catherine Center board member, set up the arrangement. “We were so happy to have Patrick and Ryan, along with Saint
Catherine staff,” she said. “Their work is a big help to us and we hope they can come back and do more!”

After they loaded the shredding into the van, Ryan and Patrick enjoyed a visit to the courtroom, where they met Probate Judge Kathleen N. Maxham, sat in her chair, and banged the gavel.

“We were thrilled to be able to get out of the building and do something useful,” said Cronin. Eventually, Cronin hopes that program participants may be able to do the shredding onsite at Town Hall, where they can more fully experience being in the community.