Law, Health Policy & Disability Center
University of Iowa College of Law
http://disability.law.uiowa.edu/dpn/
and
The Burton Blatt Institute
Syracuse University
http://bbi.syr.edu
One–Stop Toolkit
Resources of the Week Technical Assistance Project E–Mail listserv
19 January 2007
Good morning everyone,
Below please find the web site and publication of the week, as well as other resources that we hope will be useful as you work on systems change activities to help improve employment opportunities for persons with disabilities.
To subscribe and / or view past resources of the week archives, access: www.onestoptoolkit.org and click on the link to "Resources of the Week" on the right hand side of the home page.
To view an indexed list of the resources of the week by subject matter, visit the L.P.H.D.C. web site at http://disability.law.uiowa.edu/lhpdc/resources/wig/default.asp. It currently includes 20 categories, covering over 300 annotated references. Each category opens to a new window with each Resource of the Week which covered material in that area.
Have a good day and weekend!
Laura Farah
Program Associate
Law, Health Policy & Disability Center
University of Iowa College of Law
P: 617–489–0086
F: 617–489–1374
[ E–mail Lgleneck@mail.law.uiowa.edu ]
[ E–mail LFarah8@aol.com ]
[ http://www.onestoptoolkit.org ]
[The full announcement is located under the section heading "Resources of Interest."]
While Disability Program Navigators (D.P.N.) often do a lot of research on the Americans with Disabilities Act (A.D.A.) to pass on to employers, One–Stop staff, and people with disabilities, they are always looking for additional A.D.A. training and clarification on the law in various situations. The Job Accommodation Network (JAN) has announced the first seven of its 2007 Accommodation and Compliance Series Webcasts. The series unites national experts on job accommodation and disability employment law to provide one–hour training opportunities via Webcasts and will cover topics such as medical inquiries and the A.D.A., employing and accommodating individuals with psychiatric impairments, and current information on what’s happening with Title 1 of the A.D.A. (Employment Provisions). Registration for Webcasts is $30 per computer accessing the training and any number of people may participate at that connection. Some State D.P.N. Leads may be able to gather D.P.Ns from across the state for this series, while other smaller groups of D.P.Ns may be able to ‘chip in’ for the registration fee and participate in the training in one location. In addition, the series would be a great training opportunity for One–Stop staff, especially Business Service Representatives and Intensive Employment Counselors, to conveniently participate from their workforce center and learn more about JAN as a reliable resource on the A.D.A.
Individuals with learning disabilities (L.D.), and especially teenagers and young adults, are at increased risk of involvement with the juvenile justice system. Many people with L.D. (and A.D.D. / A.D.H.D.) struggle to stay focused and well–organized, have trouble with expressive and receptive language, are poor listeners and experience delays or deficits in listening and reading comprehension, and are prone to process information too quickly or too slowly and inefficiently.
It is especially important to know how to recognize features associated with L.D. in matters involving juvenile justice so the actions and intentions of these teens and young adults can be properly understood so they can be provided the services and protections they deserve. Join us on January 23 at 2:00 p.m. for an hour–long live online discussion with Peter Leone and Lili Garfinkel, two national experts on this topic, who will answer questions and reflect upon the specific types of behaviors that place kids with L.D. at–risk. The chat will provide information and resources about how parents, schools, mental health providers, juvenile justice professionals and others can provide options, appropriate treatment, solutions and resources.
How to Participate. Submit advance questions for the discussion http://www.ldtalk.org/question.php3 now or join in at discussion time to http://www.ldtalk.org/.
No special equipment other than Internet access is needed to participate in this text–based discussion. A transcript will be posted shortly after the discussion.
Lili Garfinkel is the coordinator of the Juvenile Justice Project at the PACER Center in Minneapolis <http://www.pacer.org/>. PACER is a parent center for families of children and young adults with physical, emotional, cognitive and learning disabilities. PACER provides workshops, resources, individual advocacy, training and technical assistance for parents and professionals both in Minnesota and nationally. Educated at the University of Manitoba in Winnipeg, with some post graduate work in Minnesota, Mrs. Garfinkel has worked with under–represented groups in Canada and Minnesota. She coordinated the Lets Prevent Abuse project for PACER in 1984 – 87, and started the Juvenile Justice Project in 1994, the first in the United States to consider the relationship between Juvenile Justice and the presence of disabilities. From 1999 – 2006 she was a member of the National Center on Education Disability and Juvenile Justice, a unique partnership which provided research, training and technical assistance as well as parent advocacy in this emerging field. Mrs. Garfinkel has been published widely and has presented across the country on a variety of topics pertaining to mental health, juvenile justice, special education and working with families. She has developed a handbook on Juvenile Justice and Mental health titled "Unique Challenges, Hopeful Responses," which is currently being revised and expanded to include more disability information, new IDEA regulations and issues including competency in court. She also co–authored a book with Dr. Andrew Slaby, "No One Saw My Pain" (Norton, 1994).
Peter Leone is a professor in the Department of Special Education at the University of Maryland. A former middle school special education teacher, Peter has spent a number of years studying the challenges faced by youth with disabilities who come into contact with the juvenile and criminal justice systems. He has directed the National Center on Education, Disability, and Juvenile Justice (EDJJ.org <http://www.edjj.org/> ), worked with the courts and advocates in ensuring that incarcerated youth receive services to which they are entitled, and has published studies and reports related to school discipline, exclusion, and prevention. Dr. Leone received his B.A. in history and M.A. in Special Education from the University of Iowa and received his Ph.D. in special education at the University of Washington. He and his wife Diane have three children, Andrew, 19, Kimberly 16, and Matthew 10.
The discussion will be moderated by Laura Kaloi, Director, Public Policy at the National Center for Learning Disabilities.
Transcripts of previous discussions are available http://www.ncld.org/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=899 for your review.
The National Center for Learning Disabilities brings you LDTalk.org, the Internet’s only Web site featuring discussions on issues critically important to people with learning disabilities. Access the U.R.L. for more information.
The Job Accommodation Network (JAN) has announced the first seven of its 2007 Accommodation and Compliance Series Webcasts. These one–hour training opportunities bring expertise from JAN staff and other national experts to your computer. The series unites national experts on job accommodation and disability employment law to provide one–hour training opportunities via Webcasts.
The Accommodation and Compliance Training Series provides a convenient opportunity for human resource managers, compliance officers, disability and diversity managers, and other professionals to discover ways to enhance an organization’s ability to accommodate and employ people with disabilities. The 2007 topics include:
How to participate. Webcasts use your Web browser (e.g., Internet Explorer or FireFox). You must have the Macromedia Flash plug–in on your computer. Captioning is available. Please read the How the Training Works page for more information.
Registration. Registration for Webcasts is $30 per computer accessing the training. Any number of people may participate at that connection.
Access the U.R.L. for more information including how to register.
The annual Job Accommodation Network (JAN) Conference unites JAN consultants with featured speakers who have expertise in employment law, innovative employment practices, and disability issues. With two full days of training, the JAN Conference offers three concurrent training tracks addressing accommodation issues, innovative employment practices, and A.D.A. / legal issues. Sessions will be highly interactive and include question and answer segments. In addition, JAN consultants will be available throughout the conference to address your specific questions. Continuing Education Units are available for a range of professions.
Access the U.R.L. for more information including online registration.
Telephone technology continues to advance to meet the needs of individuals who are deaf or hard of hearing, at home and in the workplace. The technology may not always look like a standard telephone and function in a traditional voice–to–voice way, but conversation still occurs from one end to the other. Individuals with differing degrees of hearing and speech ability can connect with people all over the world using telephones that include sound amplification and clarity technology, headset and wireless devices that couple with hearing aids and provide communication with cellular phones, text–telephones (T.T.Y.) and Voice–Carry–Over phones that provide text for reading and also enable the person to use their own voice to communicate, or even a telephone that provides live captions during a call.
The Job Accommodation Network (JAN) offers information regarding these and other telephone technology solutions for people who are deaf or hard of hearing.
[Excerpted from the September 15, 2006 press release.]
Access Solutions, L.L.C. has announced the launch of DisabilityWORK.com, a service that brings employers and people with disabilities together. Employers can expect to reach an untapped pool of qualified workers, while people with disabilities have a new venue in which to showcase their talents. DisabilityWORK.com consists of several different services for both employers and people with disabilities. Employers can search a database of resumes to find prospective candidates to fill needed positions. Employers can also post their job openings on this website and utilize DisabilityWORK.com’s headhunting services. People with disabilities not only can post their resumes on this website, but they also can make use of an array of services ranging from resume–writing and career coaching to job placement and job coaching. It is expected that employment service agencies, i.e. Vocational Rehabilitation offices, will be able to peruse these services as well in their daily efforts to assist people with disabilities gain employment.
Samuel Hawk, founder and president of DisabilityWORK.com, states, "Disabled Americans are a great untapped labor pool. Anecdotal evidence suggests that they work harder and are more reliable than the general population. With unemployment levels near historical low levels, employers are turning to non–traditional populations to fill their vacant positions." Hawk continues, "With DisabilityWORK.com, people with disabilities have an opportunity to showcase their talents in front of a receptive audience, i.e., interested and motivated employers." Being deaf himself, Hawk has firsthand knowledge of the challenges disabled people face in the working world. As a teenager, he was denied the chance to take over his grandfather’s business because the executors of his grandfather’s will felt that a deaf person would not be able to manage certain aspects of the business.
DisabilityWORK.com is a service of Access Solutions, L.L.C. which is a one–stop shop for products and services geared towards the community of people with disabilities. Access Solutions is also operated by Hawk.
[Excerpted from the Introduction.]
Using instructional strategies grounded in strong empirical foundations will improve the educational outcomes of students in both general and special education. The President’s Commission on Excellence in Special Education (P.C.E.S.E.) recommends the replacement of an established "culture of compliance" with a "culture of results" built on improved instruction supported by research and ensured by increased accountability (P.C.E.S.E., 2002). One issue of The Journal of Special Education highlighted a series of research–based instructional practices for children with disabilities (Cook & Schirmer, 2003). The special education literature contains several research syntheses and meta–analyses of evidence–based practices (e.g., Forness, Kavale, Blum, & Lloyd, 1997; Gersten, Schiller, & Vaughn, 2000). However, the consensus in the field is that there is a vast gap between practices proven to be successful through research and what is practiced in our schools (Greenwood, 2001). The failure to implement and sustain effective practices in the classroom has been offered as a major explanation for the poor outcomes for special education students (Greenwood & Abbott, 2001; Landrum, Tankersley, & Kauffman, 2003).
With a goal of increasing the use of evidence–based practices in special education programs and improve student outcomes, a research demonstration project was developed through a unique partnership of special educators, parents, administrators, and investigators. This brief reports on the method, implementation, and initial findings from this project.
[The following is excerpted from the publication.]
Recently in the field of special education there has been a call for the development and expansion of services for older students with intellectual disabilities outside of the high school setting (Agran, Snow, & Swaner, 1999; Smith & Puccini, 1995; Stodden & Whelley, 2004). In response, local school systems across the country have begun to provide transition services to students ages 18 and older with intellectual disabilities in post–secondary settings such as two– and four–year colleges or other community settings (Grigal, Neubert, & Moon, 2001; Hall, Kleinert, & Kearns, 2000; Neubert, Moon, & Grigal, 2004). This brief provides an overview of some successful models of transition services being implemented in post–secondary settings, describes one such model implemented by the Baltimore City Public School System in three local colleges, and presents some of the implications and strategies for success of this model.
The Medicaid Buy–In program is a key component of the federal effort to make it easier for people with disabilities to work without losing health benefits. Authorized by the Balanced Budget Act of 1997 and the Ticket to Work and Work Incentives Improvement Act of 1999, the Buy–In program allows states to expand Medicaid coverage to workers with disabilities whose income and assets ordinarily would make them ineligible for Medicaid. To be eligible for the program, an individual must have a disability (as defined by the Social Security Administration) and earned income, and must meet certain financial eligibility requirements established by the states. Participants typically "buy into" the Medicaid program by paying premiums based on income. Unlike many work–incentive programs, the Buy–In program provides health coverage without cash benefits, breaking the long–established link between the two.
States have the flexibility to customize their Buy–In programs to their unique needs, resources, and objectives. As of December 2005, 30 states were operating a Medicaid Buy–In program, bringing total nationwide enrollment to 69,218. Overall, more than 161,000 individuals participated in state Medicaid Buy–In programs between their inception and the end of 2005. This issue brief, the second in a series on workers with disabilities, explains how the Medicaid Buy–In program fits into other federal efforts to expand access to health insurance and enhance employment opportunities for adults with disabilities.