The World Association for Supported Employment (WASE) is a network of persons and organizations with the aim to promote supported employment all over the world.

WASE was established in 1995 and has since been promoting supported employment internationally. The founding members were Founding Directors:-

• Machiel Kamp – EUSE
• Larry Naeve – USA
• Fabrizio Fea – EUSE
• Marcel Korpel – Netherlands

The initial membership included representatives from European Union of Supported Employment and other national membership organisations.

Key achievements included: –

• In 2003 with assistance from the International Labour Organization (ILO), a CD Rom and Handbook were produced for developing countries and organizations who were interested in becoming involved in supported employment.
• Christy Lynch (KARE, Ireland and founding member of EUSE) was appointed as WASE Ambassador in 2003
• The Supported Employment CD Rom and Handbook were updated in 2015.
• In 2016 WASE received Consultative Status for the United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). This was in recognition of the growing attention on Supported Employment under that the UN Convention on the Rights of Disabled People Article 27 – Work and Employment.

WASE Board of Directors meet as often as they can, by attending international conferences and meeting remotely.

The 1st World Conference on Supported Employment was held in Belfast from 14 -16 June 2017 hosted by Northern Ireland Union of Supported Employment (NIUSE), European Union of Supported Employment (EUSE) and European Association of Service Providers for Disabled People (EASDP) and WASE.  Over 650 delegates, from 48 countries attend and heard from a wide range of keynote speaker and attend a range of workshops.

WASE hosted it’s General meeting at the World Conference on Supported Employment in Belfast and new Directors were appointed under the leadership of Margaret Haddock (EUSE) President, Tracey Williams (CASE) President Elect and Michael Kamp, Past President. Other countries represented at the meeting included Australia and Africa and apologies from South America (Brazil and Argentina) and Malaysia.

It was announced at the conference that the next World Conference on Supported Employment would be held in Vancouver, Canada in 2021 and hosted by Canadian Association on Supported Employment.

Following the 1st World Conference on Supported Employment the next phase for WASE was to strengthen membership, review current governance processes and procedures and review the strategic direction of WASE. The WASE Directors continued to meet regularly remotely, and met in person at the EUSE Conference in Amsterdam, Netherlands, 2019 and in Oslo, Norway, 2022. Accomplishments include the following:

• New Directors appointed to the Board from Australia and USA
• Reviewed the WASE Articles of Association and developing new by law
• Establish a new global non for-profit organisation base in Canadian Statue
• Transfer bank account from Netherlands to Canada
• Designed new logo
• Designed and developed a new website (wase.ca )