Changing Mindsets to Prepare Students with Disabilities for Integrated Employment and Success in Adult Life

Beth Clavenna-Deane, PhD Author

02/23/2021 Added

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[00:00:01.280]Good afternoon and welcome
[00:00:02.840]to the Tri-State Webinar this afternoon
[00:00:05.750]on Changing Mindsets to Prepare Students with Disabilities
[00:00:09.569]for Integrated Employment and Success in Adult Life.
[00:00:13.780]I am Beth Clavenna-Deane
[00:00:15.240]and I am the presenter for today's webinar.
[00:00:19.020]As you can see from this slide,
[00:00:20.960]I am currently a TASN Kansas MTSS State Trainer.
[00:00:25.340]And that's been about the last decade
[00:00:27.470]of my career has been MTSS, and it's been MTSS focused.
[00:00:33.040]However, prior to that, I was a transition coordinator
[00:00:38.550]and a special educator in a secondary setting.
[00:00:41.190]So a lot of my experiences
[00:00:43.020]draw on my 28 years of experience in education,
[00:00:48.490]both specifically in the special ed arena
[00:00:51.670]as well as in the general ed setting for all students.
[00:00:55.770]You can also see that I am an adjunct instructor
[00:00:58.920]for Baker University in their Special Ed Department.
[00:01:01.690]So I do still have a lot of knowledge and expertise
[00:01:05.020]that's very specific to the special ed realm
[00:01:07.800]as well as being able to have experiences
[00:01:10.810]within the general ed environment from my work with MTSS.
[00:01:16.820]For the purposes of today, it's gonna be my experiences
[00:01:19.870]as a former transition coordinator
[00:01:22.150]and my doctoral work as I pursued my PhD
[00:01:26.580]that focuses on the transition aspects
[00:01:28.790]of employment in adult life.
[00:01:30.910]So a lot of what you're gonna see today
[00:01:32.320]draws on those experiences and that knowledge.
[00:01:36.110]So let's get started.
[00:01:38.840]When you registered for this particular event,
[00:01:41.170]there were these objectives
[00:01:43.220]listed in the event registration.
[00:01:45.640]And really the focus is going to be primarily
[00:01:48.880]that integrated employment concept.
[00:01:51.840]But I also weave in conversations around predictors
[00:01:56.020]of post-school success in all realms of adult life.
[00:01:59.340]And that self-determination specifically is one
[00:02:01.890]of those big-ticket factors that has a significant impact
[00:02:06.380]on success in adult life for all individuals,
[00:02:10.610]but even more so for students with disabilities.
[00:02:12.900]So a lot of the conversations, activities, tools,
[00:02:17.100]and suggestions I make today will really fall into that
[00:02:22.370]self-advocacy, choice-making, self-determination realm.
[00:02:26.570]But yes, there will be a lot of focus
[00:02:28.590]on integrated employment and making a point for students
[00:02:33.530]to be in community-based employment
[00:02:36.230]and getting that paid employment experience.
[00:02:41.000]We like at MTSS and in TASN to think about success criteria
[00:02:45.550]in addition to your objectives.
[00:02:47.570]And this is really what are some of the things
[00:02:49.500]that you should be able to walk away and be able to do
[00:02:52.380]after this presentation.
[00:02:54.110]So you can see from this particular slide
[00:02:57.230]that there are gonna be some ways that I'm gonna describe
[00:03:00.880]what meaningful community inclusion looks like
[00:03:04.250]for students with disabilities.
[00:03:05.770]In fact, there will be four different ways
[00:03:07.700]that meaningful community inclusion can be achieved.
[00:03:11.780]I'll also go into the NTACT predictors of school success,
[00:03:16.760]post-school success that's related to career development.
[00:03:20.720]NTACT stands for the National Technical Assistance Center
[00:03:24.450]for Transition.
[00:03:25.810]So there's a whole center at the national level
[00:03:28.250]that produces a lot of resources.
[00:03:30.070]And I'm gonna dive into that a bit.
[00:03:33.150]Then I will talk a little bit
[00:03:34.690]about that career development cycle.
[00:03:37.490]And that will get into a lot of the activities
[00:03:39.650]and tools you can do to help your students be most prepared
[00:03:44.770]for the career aspects of adult life.
[00:03:48.540]And then, as I said earlier,
[00:03:49.830]I do wanna dive into that self-determination piece
[00:03:52.880]and what students who have graduated from high school
[00:03:55.930]are saying about their high school experiences
[00:03:58.060]that were most helpful.
[00:03:59.350]And self-determination is one of those key pieces
[00:04:01.730]that they bring up.
[00:04:03.350]Then you should be able to walk away
[00:04:04.650]with some practical things that you can do
[00:04:07.050]with your staff and students
[00:04:08.610]to promote that meaningful inclusion activity
[00:04:13.170]whether it's career, independent living,
[00:04:15.150]post-secondary ed, and so forth.
[00:04:18.700]Okay.
[00:04:19.533]The next slide we're gonna look at,
[00:04:21.100]I want you guys to take about 30 seconds
[00:04:23.810]to jot down the name of a student
[00:04:26.240]that might fit one of these three criteria.
[00:04:30.030]So we have student one is a student
[00:04:33.570]that has been included in general ed courses
[00:04:36.070]for most of their school day.
[00:04:38.070]Then we have student two
[00:04:39.820]has been in general ed courses as well
[00:04:42.620]but has a bit of additional support
[00:04:45.780]for academics and some social skill needs.
[00:04:49.030]And then we have student number three
[00:04:51.570]who has intense support for academics and social skills
[00:04:55.900]as well as behavioral concerns.
[00:04:58.350]And most of that support is throughout the day.
[00:05:01.710]So take a moment.
[00:05:02.680]And from your experiences with students
[00:05:05.200]in your school setting,
[00:05:07.380]if you're no longer in a school setting but previously were,
[00:05:10.920]just jot down a name of a student
[00:05:13.250]that fits just this criteria.
[00:05:15.700]I'm gonna give you about 30 seconds to jot those names down.
[00:05:18.650]Then I'll move on and kind of tell you
[00:05:20.810]why I want you to do that.
[00:05:34.080]All right.
[00:05:34.970]So hopefully, you were able to get some names jotted down.
[00:05:38.550]I'm gonna use this particular slide
[00:05:42.130]throughout the presentation.
[00:05:43.670]And every time I bring up a new content or idea,
[00:05:47.910]we're gonna go back and circle back to these three students
[00:05:51.710]and then think about how would you apply
[00:05:54.270]some of the tools or suggestions for those students.
[00:05:59.450]As we start thinking about
[00:06:01.410]post-secondary inclusive opportunities
[00:06:04.720]and integrated opportunities, what do they consist of?
[00:06:08.510]Well oftentimes, when we hear the word post-secondary,
[00:06:11.880]we think it's related specifically to this second bullet,
[00:06:16.330]post-secondary education and training.
[00:06:18.920]But in reality, post-secondary is everything adult life is.
[00:06:23.250]It's really everything after you graduate.
[00:06:26.230]So all of these four areas of adult life
[00:06:30.670]are post-secondary environments.
[00:06:33.860]And as you're thinking about strategies and activities
[00:06:38.160]in high school, you want those activities
[00:06:40.580]to lead to integrated employment,
[00:06:44.110]opportunities for post-secondary education and training,
[00:06:47.420]students to be involved in independent living,
[00:06:50.720]and community engagement.
[00:06:52.310]So the more that you can think
[00:06:54.110]about how these tools and strategies we talk about today
[00:06:58.610]lead to one or more of those opportunities
[00:07:02.390]and those environments in a positive manner,
[00:07:04.930]the better off you and your students will be
[00:07:07.760]to produce some good post-secondary success outcomes.
[00:07:12.540]Again, really it is all of these.
[00:07:15.680]But today, we're gonna focus on, at least for the majority
[00:07:20.090]of this webinar, that integrated employment aspect.
[00:07:24.040]So we're gonna start with the career development cycle.
[00:07:27.250]So as you look at this, you can see
[00:07:29.740]that there are five different areas of career development.
[00:07:34.670]And this comes from a book that Mary Morningstar,
[00:07:39.300]one of my colleagues and my mentor
[00:07:40.880]when I was a doctoral student,
[00:07:42.580]and myself have written on transition services.
[00:07:46.410]And so this particular cycle
[00:07:49.440]focuses on moving from career assessments and job shadowing
[00:07:54.840]and job development into that work-based learning
[00:07:59.380]and that paid employment opportunity.
[00:08:03.080]So I'm not gonna dig into each of these areas here
[00:08:05.420]because we're gonna talk about them
[00:08:07.210]at length throughout the rest of the next few slides.
[00:08:10.530]But I do want you to take a moment to kind of see
[00:08:13.160]how they do kind of flow together.
[00:08:16.750]You wanna assess students
[00:08:18.270]at that career assessment level to get their interests.
[00:08:21.730]You wanna think about what coursework
[00:08:23.750]within their school day might provide them some exposure
[00:08:27.260]to the careers they're interested in.
[00:08:29.920]Then you wanna also start in that same time period
[00:08:33.140]building your own partnerships with different businesses
[00:08:36.190]in the community so that when students go out
[00:08:39.060]on those community-based experiences,
[00:08:41.980]you've built a solid partnership with those employers
[00:08:46.290]and there's gonna be a pretty good working relationship.
[00:08:49.610]You want that work-based learning to
[00:08:52.110]really lead to that paid employment.
[00:08:55.450]So as you look through this, you'll see
[00:08:58.220]we kind of look at that paid employment
[00:08:59.890]being an outcome we get in the 11th or 12th grade year.
[00:09:03.530]We want as many kids to experience a paid job as possible
[00:09:08.630]in the high school setting, excuse me,
[00:09:11.520]during their high school years
[00:09:13.310]so that they have that experience under their belt
[00:09:15.860]as they move to adulthood.
[00:09:18.260]And then we start thinking about
[00:09:19.950]if they're gonna be on job sites,
[00:09:21.990]how are we gonna support them?
[00:09:23.280]Because these are students with special needs,
[00:09:26.330]so they do need additional supports.
[00:09:28.710]How can we support that in an effective manner?
[00:09:31.890]So that's really what this cycle talks about.
[00:09:34.700]And in each of the next few slides,
[00:09:36.170]I'm gonna dig in a little deeper with it.
[00:09:39.210]But first I wanna talk about the NTACT predictors.
[00:09:42.900]So you can see here
[00:09:44.610]that the National Technical Assistance Center
[00:09:47.510]for Transition has a host of different predictors
[00:09:52.150]of post-school success.
[00:09:53.450]So in this far left column are all the predictors:
[00:09:57.310]various strategies, tasks, things that teachers would do
[00:10:02.220]in high school settings that predict post-school success.
[00:10:06.650]These three columns are the different types
[00:10:08.990]of post-school environments that research has indicated
[00:10:12.840]that that particular predictor is predictive
[00:10:16.490]of good success.
[00:10:18.610]And they go across the promising practices
[00:10:21.860]to research-based practices.
[00:10:24.420]In the world of NTACT, research-based is the highest level,
[00:10:28.620]and promising is that mid level.
[00:10:31.340]So as we look at, and I'm gonna make another click here
[00:10:34.930]so that you can see,
[00:10:36.460]we look at career awareness and career in tech ed.
[00:10:40.150]Career and tech ed is research and evidence-based.
[00:10:43.480]Those are those high level.
[00:10:45.580]We have a lot of knowledge around them being predictive
[00:10:48.980]of students being successful in post-secondary ed
[00:10:52.100]and being successful in employment.
[00:10:54.760]Career awareness and really learning about careers,
[00:10:58.120]that's at that promising level.
[00:11:00.640]So in the world of NTACT, they move from promising
[00:11:04.360]to research-based to evidence-based
[00:11:07.020]which these two are the high levels.
[00:11:10.690]There's other ones on here
[00:11:12.440]that are also career development related
[00:11:15.250]like taking occupational courses
[00:11:18.220]and then pursuing work experience and paid employment.
[00:11:23.560]If you look at the paid employment and work experience,
[00:11:26.030]it's not just predictive
[00:11:27.840]in the education and employment arenas.
[00:11:30.550]It's also predictive in independent living.
[00:11:34.660]As well, and we're gonna talk at length
[00:11:36.670]about self-determination and self-advocacy.
[00:11:39.550]Similar to that paid employment work experience,
[00:11:43.360]it is at a high rate for research-based in education
[00:11:47.930]and employment, and it's promising for independent living.
[00:11:52.760]And finally, when you look down here,
[00:11:54.390]you'll see work study is listed
[00:11:56.850]as a predictor of post-school success,
[00:12:00.830]specifically in the employment area, which makes sense.
[00:12:04.810]The more opportunities you have to learn about work
[00:12:07.690]and to have good paid experiences
[00:12:10.410]as well as some volunteer experiences,
[00:12:13.240]the more opportunities you will have to be successful
[00:12:15.560]in employment after high school.
[00:12:18.420]So let's start with some career awareness.
[00:12:21.620]The big first step most people take when they're looking
[00:12:24.200]at building a career awareness activity
[00:12:27.040]or opportunity for students
[00:12:29.030]is to start with some career assessments.
[00:12:31.820]We wanna see what students' interests are, where they lie,
[00:12:37.640]what seems to fit their personal style,
[00:12:42.750]where they fall in terms of what their interests are
[00:12:44.987]and what they feel most comfortable doing.
[00:12:48.110]And this is not a one-and-done deal.
[00:12:50.580]As you can see, you wanna assess them regularly.
[00:12:54.090]In fact, you're assessing usually every year.
[00:12:57.430]Sometimes when you get up
[00:12:58.630]to those junior and senior year levels,
[00:13:01.040]they may be sitting down with those students,
[00:13:02.900]they being counselors, transition coordinators,
[00:13:06.000]special educators, to revisit those interests on a semester
[00:13:10.210]or a quarterly basis so that we can actually look at:
[00:13:13.880]Okay, are you still interested in that?
[00:13:16.160]You've taken some engineering courses.
[00:13:18.020]Are you still interested in being an engineer?
[00:13:20.730]It's important to really look at this
[00:13:22.460]from ongoing conversation.
[00:13:24.740]It's not a one-shot deal
[00:13:27.660]of taking a career interest survey in your ninth-grade year
[00:13:30.930]and that being the end all be all of what you choose.
[00:13:34.870]Personally, we all know that we have our career choices
[00:13:40.180]and options have evolved over time as adults.
[00:13:43.130]The same is true for students.
[00:13:46.250]So specifically, I put this arrow here because
[00:13:50.010]the reason we assess is because we really wanna make sure
[00:13:53.880]we know what the students are interested in.
[00:13:56.500]We may go into a career assessment assuming we know
[00:14:00.060]exactly what the student wants and would be best for them.
[00:14:04.280]But if we go into it and then we don't include the student
[00:14:08.300]in that conversation, then we may go down a path
[00:14:11.970]that is completely incorrect for what they want.
[00:14:15.000]And they may end up getting involved in an activity
[00:14:18.770]that they're not interested in,
[00:14:20.070]and that will not go well for them.
[00:14:22.130]So the more that you involve students
[00:14:24.520]in that assessment process and gather their voice
[00:14:27.597]and their interest, the better matching you can do
[00:14:31.000]to the career activities
[00:14:32.740]that you're going to be doing with them.
[00:14:35.410]So here are some ways that you could assess students.
[00:14:39.150]Most often, people give interest inventories
[00:14:41.760]to a wide array of students with disabilities.
[00:14:44.450]There's a lot of different inventories out there.
[00:14:47.630]You can start with just an interest interview
[00:14:49.580]and then you can expand to other types
[00:14:51.480]of more valid and reliable formal assessments.
[00:14:56.370]When students get a little older
[00:14:58.390]and are at actual job sites,
[00:15:01.020]you can also use those on-the-job training and observations,
[00:15:04.970]the evaluations from the employer,
[00:15:06.870]students' self evaluations of their performance.
[00:15:10.250]Those are all really important.
[00:15:12.810]Finally, if you wanna get a little more intensified,
[00:15:15.710]you can do what's called an environmental job assessment
[00:15:18.190]where you're assessing the working conditions
[00:15:21.240]that are involved in that job
[00:15:23.570]as well as the working conditions that match well
[00:15:25.960]with the student's demeanor.
[00:15:28.340]Same with job demands, social interactions.
[00:15:31.380]You wanna know, the student may be interested in a job
[00:15:35.400]but it might not fit the student's working condition,
[00:15:39.170]demeanor, demands or social interactions at this stage.
[00:15:42.770]And so, you wanna make sure you start looking
[00:15:44.720]for ways to support and accommodate that student
[00:15:47.510]so that that job that they're interested in
[00:15:49.640]can match what they're ready to do.
[00:15:53.690]Okay, so this is where we're gonna pull back
[00:15:55.710]those students that you wrote down earlier
[00:15:58.440]and take 30 to 45 seconds to just jot down
[00:16:02.210]what would be some things you would do
[00:16:03.960]to assess these three students.
[00:16:06.230]Remember, student one is a student in general ed.
[00:16:09.360]Student two needs some support.
[00:16:11.910]Student three needs some intense support.
[00:16:14.630]Think about those interest interviews,
[00:16:16.600]career interest surveys, job observations and evaluations.
[00:16:21.330]What might be some good things to do with them?
[00:16:41.500]All right, well hopefully,
[00:16:42.500]you were able to get at least one item down for each
[00:16:46.000]or a few items down for one or more of the students.
[00:16:49.470]I'm gonna show you the next slide
[00:16:51.890]and kind of give you some ideas that I had
[00:16:54.430]in relation to each of these students.
[00:16:56.830]And I bolded the things that I think most commonly occur
[00:17:00.610]for each student based upon the student's need and access
[00:17:04.410]in the general ed setting.
[00:17:06.340]Maybe some of your results look like this.
[00:17:08.750]Interest inventories for all students,
[00:17:11.740]for each of these three students,
[00:17:14.040]plus a student interview.
[00:17:15.600]You might also look at grades,
[00:17:17.680]how well they've used their accommodations.
[00:17:20.310]Maybe you'll do a social skills assessment as well.
[00:17:23.950]For sure, for some students,
[00:17:25.690]if they're already on a job site,
[00:17:27.820]whether it's volunteer or paid,
[00:17:29.850]you'd wanna have some job observations and evaluations.
[00:17:33.840]I added for the student, the third student
[00:17:36.300]who has the more intensive needs, that that might be
[00:17:39.610]you could still do a written interest inventory,
[00:17:42.480]but there are pictorial inventories as well.
[00:17:46.420]I also added for this particular student
[00:17:48.660]that there be a family interview
[00:17:50.860]in case the student is non-verbal
[00:17:53.200]and may not be able to verbally describe
[00:17:56.670]what they're interested in.
[00:17:58.040]You may have to do a combination of a variety of things
[00:18:00.850]as well as talking to the family about some things
[00:18:03.890]that the student shows interest in at home.
[00:18:07.700]So let's move on to the next slide.
[00:18:10.750]We're gonna be looking at this cycle of a little more depth.
[00:18:14.390]So the career development cycle has pretty much
[00:18:17.330]those three areas in it: career awareness,
[00:18:20.640]which is where that assessment really falls;
[00:18:23.780]career exploration, which kind of combines with awareness
[00:18:27.720]and taking some courses, seeing what your interests are,
[00:18:31.690]digging into them a little bit more;
[00:18:33.980]and then the higher level is that career experience.
[00:18:37.430]So when you've started looking at,
[00:18:40.120]as a student you started narrowing your interests down,
[00:18:43.370]now we're gonna start looking at some of those experiences
[00:18:46.020]in the community
[00:18:47.410]to learn about the job a little more deeply.
[00:18:50.210]This really is a cycle, though.
[00:18:51.890]It's important to think of it like that.
[00:18:54.640]You may go through this whole cycle in your sophomore year
[00:18:58.840]around a particular job you thought you were interested in
[00:19:02.150]and you get to this experience and realize,
[00:19:04.250]no, that's not at all what I wanted.
[00:19:06.930]So you're gonna go back to that career awareness stage
[00:19:09.840]and reassess what is it that I like and don't like,
[00:19:12.870]and how do I wanna get there?
[00:19:15.870]So I took this quote from a former Tri-State webinar
[00:19:21.490]from Peter Gerhardt.
[00:19:23.420]He did a webinar on inclusion in the community as well,
[00:19:27.500]and, you know, opportunities for that.
[00:19:30.060]And this was a quote that he stated in that webinar.
[00:19:32.510]And I thought it just kind of hit home with me.
[00:19:35.307]"I can't teach you to not be aggressive in the supermarket
[00:19:39.467]"when I'm not taking you to the supermarket."
[00:19:42.620]So I think that really speaks highly to this cycle.
[00:19:47.720]You can't just live with your students here
[00:19:50.590]in career awareness and career exploration.
[00:19:53.490]We can't just keep talking about the careers.
[00:19:56.710]We need to actually get them onto job sites
[00:20:00.060]and experience those careers.
[00:20:01.580]And I tend to look at this from a low-risk, high-reward,
[00:20:06.000]cost-benefit analysis.
[00:20:08.450]High school, where you're in that entitlement system,
[00:20:12.230]is a low-risk, high-reward setting.
[00:20:15.970]You're not necessarily having to get a paid job
[00:20:19.230]to pay for your apartment, to pay for your living expenses,
[00:20:22.960]to pay for your food.
[00:20:24.910]The purpose of getting a job in the community
[00:20:27.080]for you in high school is to learn those skills
[00:20:29.990]so that you can be an improved employee in the future.
[00:20:34.250]So the risk of not being able to live independently is low
[00:20:39.760]and the reward of learning those skills is quite high.
[00:20:43.420]So it's important to think we need to be thinking long-term.
[00:20:47.600]We don't wanna have our students
[00:20:48.930]live in this part of the cycle.
[00:20:50.710]They need to be able to move through it
[00:20:52.720]and truly experience it.
[00:20:54.720]But to do that,
[00:20:55.553]we do have to get them out in the community to do that.
[00:20:58.470]So pretty much the rest of what we're gonna talk about
[00:21:01.290]leads to that.
[00:21:04.950]All right, so let's talk about starting
[00:21:07.110]at that eighth-ish grade level.
[00:21:09.930]So in Kansas, transition starts on the IEP at age 14.
[00:21:15.040]In other states, it follows the national guidelines
[00:21:18.040]of starting at 16.
[00:21:20.290]But 16 is about the time kids are mostly sophomores,
[00:21:24.740]if not juniors.
[00:21:26.120]And there's a lot of stuff that can be done prior to that
[00:21:29.740]to still prepare kids for life after high school.
[00:21:32.960]So here at that career awareness stage
[00:21:35.850]once you've learned what kids are interested in,
[00:21:39.620]what careers they seem to be kind of navigating to,
[00:21:43.200]there's a lot of different activities
[00:21:44.970]that might be beneficial for them.
[00:21:48.000]Within the cycle,
[00:21:49.110]there's a multitude of opportunities that are beneficial.
[00:21:51.700]And these are just a few of them.
[00:21:54.120]Career awareness really exposes students
[00:21:56.240]to those various careers that exist across an array
[00:21:59.590]of domains from the service industry, to helping others,
[00:22:03.210]to technology, engineering, the arts, et cetera.
[00:22:07.850]Most students learn about their careers,
[00:22:10.370]and the more that they do, the better chance they have
[00:22:13.530]of choosing one that really fits their interests.
[00:22:17.300]More often than not, this career awareness stage
[00:22:20.000]occurs kind of in that eighth to ninth grade.
[00:22:23.500]And it's a lot of times those field trips,
[00:22:25.860]guest speakers, career courses,
[00:22:28.700]taking those interest inventories and so forth.
[00:22:32.410]It's usually by about your 10th grade year
[00:22:34.700]that you're starting to get some on-the-job exposure.
[00:22:36.900]And that would be that job shadow day.
[00:22:39.440]So I don't know if your building
[00:22:41.160]or district does job shadows,
[00:22:44.260]but there is a national Job Shadow Day
[00:22:46.317]and it's usually in the spring.
[00:22:48.830]So that's something that you can tap into
[00:22:51.490]or you can set one up locally yourself.
[00:22:54.230]And that would really build
[00:22:55.500]on that school-business partnership aspect of the cycle,
[00:23:00.230]that you've built some relationships with some employers
[00:23:03.690]and you wanna push forward and get some exposure to that.
[00:23:07.810]But at all grade levels,
[00:23:09.210]students can start learning about different career
[00:23:12.417]and tech ed courses in their pathways of interest.
[00:23:15.550]And they should be able to go in and observe
[00:23:17.680]or learn about those courses so they can determine
[00:23:20.460]if that's one that they wanna look at.
[00:23:22.160]It's a great career awareness thing
[00:23:24.700]to put on a course of study
[00:23:26.670]and to have as an opportunity for students
[00:23:28.830]'cause it really builds their awareness of what's out there.
[00:23:33.010]Furthermore, if you haven't already established
[00:23:35.490]those school-business partnerships,
[00:23:37.200]these field trips and guest speakers are great ways
[00:23:39.790]to get that introduction started.
[00:23:43.050]As a transition coordinator,
[00:23:44.390]I usually tried three different steps
[00:23:47.480]to kind of set up field trips, guest speakers,
[00:23:50.200]and at some point, eventually those job sites
[00:23:52.880]from the partnerships.
[00:23:54.570]I'd start with a list of employers
[00:23:56.270]we already had a relationship with,
[00:23:58.510]places where I already had placed students.
[00:24:01.210]And then I asked them if they had any colleagues
[00:24:03.290]in the profession,
[00:24:07.450]someone they would be willing to tap into
[00:24:09.680]or give a good word about, about our program.
[00:24:12.900]And that way, we could possibly tap into them
[00:24:15.390]for say a guest speaker or a field trip.
[00:24:18.890]And then, my fellow transition coordinators and I
[00:24:21.200]would host also a chamber of commerce breakfast or meeting
[00:24:25.250]to kind of give the rest of some employers
[00:24:27.740]that are affiliated with the chamber
[00:24:29.730]more awareness of what our program provides.
[00:24:33.040]And then finally, when I met with families at IEP meetings,
[00:24:36.750]I would often ask them if they wanted to present,
[00:24:40.000]especially if they came from a business or a field
[00:24:42.810]or a career area where we may not have had a guest speaker.
[00:24:46.140]Particularly, I'm thinking of one of my middle schools
[00:24:49.070]that I worked with.
[00:24:50.310]One of my student's parents was a broadcaster for radio.
[00:24:54.820]And I did ask him to come guest speak to one of my classes.
[00:24:58.570]So there's places where you can tap into,
[00:25:00.780]whether it's businesses you have a partnership with,
[00:25:03.660]the chamber of commerce, family members.
[00:25:06.350]You wanna start building that network.
[00:25:09.357]It's important to think about it from that aspect
[00:25:12.740]so that you can make that network as robust as possible.
[00:25:17.100]Specifically thinking about family members,
[00:25:19.240]my son's school does a beginning of the year survey
[00:25:22.170]with all parents and asks them for their profession
[00:25:25.220]so they can have a database
[00:25:27.120]of people in various different career domains.
[00:25:30.180]This way their CTE courses, so thinking about those courses,
[00:25:34.840]that are focused on that career
[00:25:36.240]can reach out to those professionals
[00:25:38.170]and ask them to come speak to those classes.
[00:25:40.890]Word of mouth from employers as well as parents
[00:25:44.290]really helps build that career development.
[00:25:46.720]So if you're thinking of ways to expose your students
[00:25:50.100]to more careers, those are places to start.
[00:25:55.260]Career exploration.
[00:25:56.810]So this oftentimes starts in that 10th to 11th grade year.
[00:26:01.810]And as you can see, there is some overlap here
[00:26:04.760]between career awareness and exploration
[00:26:07.420]in terms of when this starts,
[00:26:08.800]and that's really that job shadow piece.
[00:26:11.800]Most often, 10th grade is that transitional year
[00:26:14.910]to move from learning about careers
[00:26:16.930]to starting to explore them and understand them
[00:26:19.780]and getting a little on-the-job experience with them.
[00:26:23.020]I put the word weeks in quotes because you go
[00:26:26.750]from maybe a job shadow day to job shadow two weeks
[00:26:31.980]setting up a longer period of time
[00:26:34.630]where students really get to see the nuts and bolts
[00:26:36.980]of how that particular career works.
[00:26:40.400]If you have an advisory class or a seminar
[00:26:43.750]and it's allowable for students to travel during that time,
[00:26:47.720]you set up the transportation and you're able to get kids
[00:26:50.380]out on job sites for a couple week time span.
[00:26:53.880]That can be very beneficial,
[00:26:55.600]and this can get them valuable exposure to that job.
[00:27:00.300]Sometimes students think they want X job,
[00:27:03.040]say a veterinarian.
[00:27:04.630]And when they visit the vet's office
[00:27:06.910]on the one job shadow day, they're really excited
[00:27:09.630]'cause they got to pet all the dogs and cats
[00:27:12.210]and they were really excited about it.
[00:27:14.200]And the next year, or maybe the next semester,
[00:27:16.530]they go on a two-week job shadow
[00:27:18.510]and they actually get to see
[00:27:19.690]the day-to-day workings of the vet office
[00:27:22.120]and see all the things that go into taking care
[00:27:24.430]of sick animals.
[00:27:25.630]And they realize while they love animals,
[00:27:27.810]they're not really sure
[00:27:28.690]they wanna take care of sick animals.
[00:27:30.980]So that helps them to narrow down
[00:27:32.690]maybe the experiences that student might want
[00:27:35.460]are in a pet store, or a groomer, or a pet sitter,
[00:27:39.820]or a pet daycare.
[00:27:41.360]You know, there's a lot of different opportunities
[00:27:43.520]in the animal care world besides just being a veterinarian.
[00:27:47.230]So job shadowing is really a great step to take
[00:27:52.790]for that career exploration.
[00:27:55.980]These really should be short term
[00:27:58.680]and they shouldn't go too long
[00:28:00.220]'cause it's really still at that exploration stage.
[00:28:02.910]And that kind of leads me actually to this next bullet.
[00:28:06.380]Your community-based employment opportunities
[00:28:08.840]often happen when kids get into that 11th grade year.
[00:28:12.840]And the 11th grade year can be a combination
[00:28:15.560]of let's explore a little longer time period
[00:28:18.820]of maybe a quarter at a job site,
[00:28:21.460]so thinking back to that veterinarian interest.
[00:28:25.230]Now that you know that the student doesn't really
[00:28:27.020]wanna work with sick animals,
[00:28:29.350]you might do a quarter at say a dog daycare instead.
[00:28:34.650]And they're working there and learning more
[00:28:36.420]about animal care from that aspect.
[00:28:39.520]So you can do that for a quarter and then shift
[00:28:42.170]to a different animal care setting for second quarter.
[00:28:45.550]And maybe by working in those exposures,
[00:28:47.970]in those businesses, you can start tapping into
[00:28:51.750]is there an opportunity for a paid part-time job
[00:28:54.770]maybe for the second semester.
[00:28:57.430]Then again, this last bullet here,
[00:28:59.820]enrolling in the CTE course in the pathway of interest.
[00:29:03.480]I really think that this particular aspect gets forgotten
[00:29:07.520]in the transition world for students with disabilities.
[00:29:10.800]Students with disabilities should have equitable access
[00:29:15.120]to those career and tech ed courses.
[00:29:17.320]And a lot of times those courses are in-house.
[00:29:20.080]Like your graphics and technology courses are often taught
[00:29:24.100]within the high school building.
[00:29:25.950]And they should be able to go into those courses
[00:29:28.140]and get some exposure.
[00:29:29.740]So starting to look at those
[00:29:31.110]and what might be the best options might be a good idea.
[00:29:35.070]Okay, in terms of kind of that last aspect of the cycle
[00:29:40.140]is career experiences.
[00:29:41.910]And this really leads to that final result.
[00:29:44.440]We want as many kids to be involved
[00:29:47.120]in paid employment as possible.
[00:29:49.710]Ultimately, if we want them to achieve
[00:29:51.930]that integrated paid employment as an adult,
[00:29:55.200]they're gonna need to have
[00:29:56.160]some good experiences in high school.
[00:29:58.760]Yet, this can also be extremely challenging
[00:30:01.870]for a special educator, a transition coordinator,
[00:30:05.560]a career developer to really set that up for their students.
[00:30:09.690]However, like all other high school students,
[00:30:12.560]there really are an array of part-time jobs
[00:30:15.010]that students can do.
[00:30:16.730]This is where you wanna be creative, strategic,
[00:30:20.200]and you wanna have the student involved in the conversation.
[00:30:23.780]That's really probably the most critical thing to hit home.
[00:30:28.150]Because let's say you have established this really
[00:30:31.040]great partnership with your local feed supply company.
[00:30:35.490]And that manager reaches out to you and says,
[00:30:37.527]"Hey, I have two part-time job openings.
[00:30:40.457]"And we've always had such a good working relationship
[00:30:43.457]"with your program.
[00:30:44.290]"Do you have two students that you can send my way
[00:30:47.807]"that I could interview and maybe employ?"
[00:30:50.880]And you're so eager to get your kids,
[00:30:52.770]especially your seniors, onto a paid site,
[00:30:55.890]you're like, "Absolutely."
[00:30:57.750]You send two students over.
[00:30:59.380]You get 'em set up on the job.
[00:31:02.610]But you neglected to ask them first if they were interested
[00:31:05.840]or to really look at that assessment
[00:31:07.570]to see if that's something they like.
[00:31:10.370]One student was fine with working on the site,
[00:31:12.900]even though it wasn't really related to his interests
[00:31:15.630]because he just wanted some extra money and some experience
[00:31:18.550]and it was good to go.
[00:31:19.870]But when winter break comes along, that student decides,
[00:31:23.690]oh, I'm gonna put in my two weeks notice,
[00:31:25.860]quits, and then goes to look for another job.
[00:31:27.770]So it wasn't really a sustainable effort for them.
[00:31:30.960]They were on the job for a couple months.
[00:31:33.590]However, the other student was not fine with it
[00:31:35.700]from the beginning.
[00:31:37.130]She didn't like the smell of livestock feed.
[00:31:40.220]And so, she stopped showing up to work after the first day.
[00:31:44.710]And it did not work out well for her.
[00:31:47.750]So while the first student might've been a mild success
[00:31:51.550]for you, the second student obviously wasn't.
[00:31:55.890]And as you think about the first student,
[00:31:57.760]it wasn't a long lasting experience either
[00:31:59.850]so it's not probably a full success either.
[00:32:03.410]So it's really important to think about how do I balance.
[00:32:08.150]I have this local feed store
[00:32:10.830]coming to me wanting employees.
[00:32:13.270]Maybe my first response to him is,
[00:32:16.567]"I'm excited that you're looking at our program.
[00:32:19.637]"Let me see if I have students that have shown interest
[00:32:22.017]"in this before I send somebody your way."
[00:32:24.370]And then you go back to the students
[00:32:26.040]and you look at their assessments, look at your plan.
[00:32:29.460]Who do I have that might be interested in this industry?
[00:32:32.800]Or who do I have that says they just want a part-time job
[00:32:35.350]and they have no qualms about where it is?
[00:32:38.510]And then you put that in front of the students
[00:32:41.010]and let them have an opportunity to make a choice.
[00:32:44.210]I think that's hugely important and often forgotten.
[00:32:47.730]So I think it's critically important to think about it
[00:32:50.150]from that perspective.
[00:32:52.270]You want kids to have that paid employment.
[00:32:54.900]You want to be at a place where you can support them
[00:32:57.500]if they need it, but you also want them
[00:32:59.800]to be able to have a voice in the process.
[00:33:01.990]And I think when you think broadly about it,
[00:33:04.270]you would want all your students to have that.
[00:33:07.490]Again, the career and tech ed coursework,
[00:33:10.150]really important to keep thinking about that
[00:33:13.150]and how are kids being involved in that.
[00:33:15.640]Because a lot of times,
[00:33:17.070]especially if you're in a block CTE class,
[00:33:20.670]say woodworking or construction technology,
[00:33:23.710]they're going to already have work-based learning
[00:33:26.380]embedded within that course.
[00:33:28.580]So you can get to this paid employment experience
[00:33:33.117]and that really discrete experience
[00:33:36.080]by looking at some of those CTE courses.
[00:33:38.980]It's important to continue to look at it
[00:33:40.590]from that perspective.
[00:33:44.980]Another comment from Peter Gerhardt's presentation
[00:33:49.240]that I think I like to kind of end this community-based
[00:33:52.710]integrated employment conversation about is,
[00:33:56.127]"Nobody has to earn the right to be in the community."
[00:33:59.820]And I think it's an important quote
[00:34:01.870]to just stop and think about,
[00:34:04.410]that a lot of times we put up a lot of gates
[00:34:07.460]and a lot of prerequisites that we artificially create
[00:34:12.180]that prevents students from having those natural experiences
[00:34:15.560]in the community because they might have a behavior problem,
[00:34:19.360]because they have to demonstrate
[00:34:21.070]that they can handle that setting.
[00:34:23.750]But again, going back to,
[00:34:25.527]"I can't teach you to not be aggressive in the supermarket
[00:34:29.147]"if I never take you to the supermarket."
[00:34:32.510]It's kind of the same mindset.
[00:34:35.150]They shouldn't have to earn the right to be in the community
[00:34:38.230]because the community is where
[00:34:39.360]they're going to live as an adult.
[00:34:41.490]So we need to think broadly about
[00:34:43.360]how can we make the experiences
[00:34:45.720]tailored to the student's need
[00:34:48.050]with the support that best help them
[00:34:50.840]be successful in the community and prepares the community
[00:34:54.860]for the opportunities that these students can bring
[00:34:57.290]to their environment.
[00:34:59.120]That's really what this is saying.
[00:35:00.720]You don't have to earn the right to be in the community.
[00:35:03.200]You should be able to go into the community
[00:35:05.620]with support to be successful.
[00:35:09.100]All right, let's look at those three students again
[00:35:13.150]and think about it from that aspect of
[00:35:16.500]how would you provide those career development experiences
[00:35:19.840]for student one, two, and three.
[00:35:22.080]And because we're getting a bit short on time,
[00:35:24.060]don't worry too much about the last two bullets.
[00:35:26.910]But take your 30 seconds to just write down for student one,
[00:35:30.810]what kinds of experiences might I do
[00:35:33.610]in sophomore year for that student?
[00:35:35.977]And the same for two and three.
[00:35:38.120]What might be one or two things
[00:35:39.950]for each of those students you could do?
[00:35:42.270]Take about 30 seconds to just jot that down?
[00:36:00.670]All right.
[00:36:01.860]So as you can see, I again, bolded some answers.
[00:36:06.600]I think the common thread here,
[00:36:08.980]as you can tell, is job shadows.
[00:36:11.300]I truly believe in that opportunity
[00:36:13.770]because for one, it's often short term.
[00:36:17.600]It's directly in the area of interest for the student.
[00:36:20.930]And it can often lead if it's matched well
[00:36:24.820]to paid employment.
[00:36:26.620]The other thing that is often a thread throughout this
[00:36:30.510]is that paid employment.
[00:36:32.370]You have the paid part-time job for the student one,
[00:36:35.800]paid work experience during either the high school day
[00:36:38.520]or after school for student two.
[00:36:40.830]And then I'm gonna take about 30 seconds
[00:36:42.900]to describe this, but I highly recommend
[00:36:45.900]you look up customized employment.
[00:36:48.750]For student three who has the more intense needs,
[00:36:51.870]customized employment might be the best option.
[00:36:54.340]And that really takes into account non-verbal communication,
[00:36:59.200]interests from a wide array of ways to assess interest.
[00:37:03.290]And it really looks deeply into that observational activity.
[00:37:07.970]Because once you observe where the student's interests lie,
[00:37:11.380]you might be able to carve out some job tasks
[00:37:15.100]within an employment setting
[00:37:17.180]you have a good partnership with
[00:37:18.910]that might be ideal for a student.
[00:37:20.800]But just placing them in some standard job
[00:37:24.090]may not be the best option.
[00:37:25.890]So you have to look broadly at what's best for the student,
[00:37:29.060]where are they most interested,
[00:37:30.820]and how can we carve out opportunities for that?
[00:37:33.870]So that job carving piece is a huge component
[00:37:36.900]of customized employment.
[00:37:41.500]We're gonna move on now to post-secondary ed and training.
[00:37:45.210]And with that, I'm gonna focus on that self-determination
[00:37:49.780]and psychological empowerment section.
[00:37:52.540]As you can see, those areas were promising to research-based
[00:37:56.680]as predictors of post-school success.
[00:37:59.690]And they really are digging into:
[00:38:02.210]What does the student want?
[00:38:03.990]How do we know?
[00:38:05.450]And what is he or she telling us verbally and non-verbally?
[00:38:10.180]We wanna take time to understand self-determination
[00:38:13.850]and how we can build that for our students.
[00:38:17.800]Self-determination and self-determined behavior
[00:38:20.420]by definition is volitional,
[00:38:23.670]primary causal agent in one's life,
[00:38:27.261]and maintains one's quality of life.
[00:38:30.580]As you can see, there are essential elements
[00:38:33.050]to self-determination
[00:38:34.760]that I'm gonna kind of unpack in the next slide.
[00:38:37.480]So we're gonna move to that slide.
[00:38:41.250]So what does all that mean,
[00:38:42.800]things like autonomy, self-regulated behavior,
[00:38:45.700]psychological empowerment, et cetera?
[00:38:48.810]It means that students are involved
[00:38:50.650]in their own decision-making.
[00:38:52.070]They're able to determine their own path.
[00:38:54.970]They get to make choices
[00:38:56.480]about what is happening for themselves.
[00:38:59.230]And they get to evaluate their own choices,
[00:39:01.860]make some goals, evaluate those goals,
[00:39:05.090]and adjust their behavior based on that.
[00:39:08.160]When you take a moment
[00:39:09.190]and you think about the three students you wrote down,
[00:39:12.570]just take a moment to think:
[00:39:15.390]Are they involved in their own decision-making?
[00:39:18.540]Have they had a chance to make choices
[00:39:20.930]in an appropriate manner for what they wanted?
[00:39:25.420]Oftentimes when we stop and think about it,
[00:39:28.230]we realize in the high school day,
[00:39:30.770]professionals make a lot of decisions for kids
[00:39:33.810]and the kids don't make a lot of decisions for themselves.
[00:39:37.420]In fact, that is one of the big aspects of the differences
[00:39:41.180]between high school and post-secondary ed
[00:39:44.040]and why post-secondary education opportunities
[00:39:47.200]as well as employment really are so difficult
[00:39:50.660]for our students.
[00:39:52.030]Because in high school, it's an entitlement opportunity.
[00:39:55.920]As professionals, we're required to make sure
[00:39:58.250]these supports happen for students.
[00:40:00.570]And so, we're driving a lot of the decision-making.
[00:40:03.940]Yet they leave high school,
[00:40:06.180]they go onto those post-secondary settings,
[00:40:08.960]whether it's college, community college, employment,
[00:40:13.240]and they have to be the one to speak up
[00:40:15.130]and drive their own decisions.
[00:40:17.050]They have to ask for their own accommodations.
[00:40:19.800]They have to do all those things on their own
[00:40:22.560]because it has changed from an entitlement system
[00:40:27.800]to an eligibility system.
[00:40:29.640]So they have to know what they're eligible
[00:40:31.640]to get support for.
[00:40:34.830]As a result, they really need opportunities
[00:40:38.050]to learn how to make those choices,
[00:40:40.470]make decisions and problem solve
[00:40:43.000]so that they can be as best prepared for asking for help,
[00:40:48.090]the right kind of help, when they need it.
[00:40:52.410]One thing from Ellison's interview
[00:40:56.750]on one of the other Tri-State webinars,
[00:40:59.750]Terry Swanson was able to interview Dr. Ellison
[00:41:03.230]and one of his students
[00:41:04.740]and they were talking about post-secondary education.
[00:41:07.630]And one of the things that he stated
[00:41:09.740]that I think kind of drives the rest of this conversation
[00:41:13.660]is, "Adults have to seek out their own accommodations."
[00:41:17.090]It's not sought to them.
[00:41:19.950]There are not support service workers looking for them.
[00:41:23.360]They don't have a case manager touching base with them
[00:41:26.730]every day or every week.
[00:41:28.530]Those students in post-secondary settings
[00:41:32.250]and employees in employment settings
[00:41:35.730]have to ask for the accommodations themselves.
[00:41:39.110]Therefore, as I say here, high school students
[00:41:42.770]really need those opportunities
[00:41:44.110]to request their accommodations.
[00:41:46.550]But, and I say this in bold capital letters,
[00:41:50.420]underlined, italicized,
[00:41:53.260]before all that, they actually need to be involved
[00:41:56.470]in deciding which accommodations they need.
[00:41:59.210]I want you to take a minute and just think to yourself,
[00:42:04.670]how many students' IEPs have you seen where
[00:42:07.500]the same accommodations are listed for every student?
[00:42:12.190]Well, first of all, that's not very individualized.
[00:42:14.770]Unfortunately, it's very common.
[00:42:17.400]And a lot of times,
[00:42:18.790]when I used to be a transition coordinator,
[00:42:20.870]I would sit down with students and say,
[00:42:23.477]"Do you use this extended time on assignments?
[00:42:27.137]"Do you need the quiet area,
[00:42:29.707]"a separate space for completing tests?
[00:42:32.607]"Do you use it?"
[00:42:35.000]And a lot of times, the kids would say no.
[00:42:37.640]So then we would talk about what is it that they need.
[00:42:40.850]And it might be something completely different.
[00:42:42.600]Or they may actually need to use that accommodation,
[00:42:46.680]but they didn't even know what it was
[00:42:49.200]and didn't know to ask for it.
[00:42:51.100]So it's important for kids to be involved
[00:42:54.760]in what those accommodations are
[00:42:57.280]as well as involving the families who need to have
[00:43:01.970]an ability to have a voice in that process as well.
[00:43:07.060]There's ways to involve family members
[00:43:09.610]and students more directly in that process.
[00:43:12.837]And we call that person-centered planning.
[00:43:15.240]And there are some tools here
[00:43:16.600]that I'm gonna talk real briefly about on the next slides
[00:43:19.740]as we start to wrap up the conversations here.
[00:43:23.400]So I want you to take a moment and look.
[00:43:25.600]The first one is the Self-Determined Learning Model
[00:43:28.430]of Instruction.
[00:43:29.960]This particular one has three phases.
[00:43:34.210]Students set a goal about what it is they're interested in
[00:43:38.077]and what they wanna learn,
[00:43:39.690]what do we wanna know about what I want to learn;
[00:43:42.330]what am I gonna need to do, to change, to make it happen;
[00:43:45.220]and so forth.
[00:43:46.960]Then they take action.
[00:43:48.090]So they set a goal.
[00:43:49.500]They take some action about that goal.
[00:43:51.770]What am I gonna learn?
[00:43:52.990]How am I gonna do it?
[00:43:54.040]When am I gonna do it?
[00:43:55.620]And then after they do it, they adjust it.
[00:43:58.000]So they do have to evaluate.
[00:43:59.270]It takes a moment to evaluate that goal
[00:44:02.120]and see what did they learn.
[00:44:04.830]So these are the three parts
[00:44:06.170]of the Self-Determined Learning Model of Instruction.
[00:44:09.000]And really, this is just kids being more involved
[00:44:12.200]in setting goals for themselves and making decisions.
[00:44:15.990]You can do this with setting goals on the IEP,
[00:44:19.760]setting individual weekly goals with students.
[00:44:23.630]You can do it with a variety of different things.
[00:44:26.000]The more that you give them that experience,
[00:44:27.900]the better they're gonna be at being able to make decisions.
[00:44:33.000]The next one is called The Dream Sheet.
[00:44:35.300]And this can often be used
[00:44:36.810]with both students and family members.
[00:44:39.860]And what you do is you sit down
[00:44:41.430]and start filling in these boxes,
[00:44:44.210]specifically these top three first:
[00:44:47.400]strengths I bring to reach my vision;
[00:44:50.490]what's my vision for the future;
[00:44:52.510]what are the resources I'm gonna need to work towards that;
[00:44:55.920]and what are some action steps I'm gonna need to take?
[00:44:58.270]So this is just a graphic for helping
[00:45:01.200]discuss some goals for the future
[00:45:04.310]and having students problem solve.
[00:45:06.190]What are the things I need to do to get to that vision?
[00:45:10.270]My Good Day Plan comes from the imdetermined.org website.
[00:45:14.980]And this is really valuable
[00:45:17.000]for students who struggle with being able to communicate
[00:45:20.870]their needs really effectively or appropriately.
[00:45:26.110]Being able to assess kind of what happens on a good day.
[00:45:30.020]Is it happening right now?
[00:45:32.060]What needs to happen to make it a good day?
[00:45:34.710]And who can support me?
[00:45:37.090]This particular aspect of it, the support part,
[00:45:40.300]I think is really the big unique component
[00:45:43.820]of the My Good Day Plan.
[00:45:45.570]Because it starts the conversation of using accommodations.
[00:45:49.540]Who can help me?
[00:45:50.840]What do I need to help me make a good day happen?
[00:45:54.120]The more the kids can start talking about this
[00:45:56.730]and taking action on it, the more experience they have
[00:46:00.270]with problem solving and decision-making.
[00:46:04.460]The IPLAN is really beneficial.
[00:46:06.960]And I would say for that student number one,
[00:46:09.910]this might be something that would be good for them.
[00:46:12.610]It's a way to set up a student-led IEP.
[00:46:16.160]They would inventory their strengths,
[00:46:17.900]provide that inventory information,
[00:46:20.490]listen and respond to feedback,
[00:46:22.360]ask questions about the feedback, and then name your goals.
[00:46:26.500]So it's really important to start thinking about
[00:46:30.440]how can I set up some of these experiences for my students
[00:46:33.910]so that they learn how to ask for accommodations
[00:46:37.290]and really get involved in that decision-making process
[00:46:40.980]more strategically in high school
[00:46:43.120]so that when they're getting ready
[00:46:45.140]to think about career development
[00:46:47.120]and post-secondary education,
[00:46:49.080]they're able to be actively involved in the discussion.
[00:46:53.940]All of these tools kind of provide
[00:46:55.660]that self-determination opportunities
[00:46:57.600]through learning what an IEP is,
[00:47:00.100]experiencing how those accommodations are used,
[00:47:03.760]setting those meaningful goals,
[00:47:06.380]and really moving through that to lead their own IEPs.
[00:47:12.490]Why do we do these things?
[00:47:14.050]And here's really a piece that I want
[00:47:15.960]to hit home with everyone.
[00:47:18.060]Because as an adult, students won't have an IEP,
[00:47:21.980]but they will still need support.
[00:47:24.400]And that inclusion in the community will be highly dependent
[00:47:28.270]on them being able to advocate for that support.
[00:47:30.550]So if you want them to be in paid employment as adults,
[00:47:34.130]they're gonna have to be able to appropriately
[00:47:36.570]and effectively advocate for the support that they need
[00:47:40.470]while balancing that with being able to provide the employer
[00:47:44.060]with the employment aspects that they need.
[00:47:48.010]Therefore, they're gonna need to know
[00:47:49.660]what kind of support they need, how to request that support,
[00:47:53.640]how to adjust and evaluate goals to make progress,
[00:47:57.070]and ultimately to lead their own IEPs
[00:47:59.650]because they have to lead their own life goals
[00:48:03.270]in a lot of different ways.
[00:48:06.090]So back to your three students.
[00:48:08.000]As you think about student involvement, self-determination,
[00:48:11.770]how would you provide these opportunities
[00:48:13.590]for student number one, two, and three?
[00:48:16.340]Take a few moments to do that.
[00:48:18.240]And I'm gonna stop sharing for just a second
[00:48:20.680]while you guys just write down
[00:48:22.430]what would be some self-determination activities
[00:48:24.740]you might do for these students: one, two, and three?
[00:49:06.250]All right, I'm gonna start sharing again.
[00:49:07.920]I wanted to get to the correct slide
[00:49:10.940]so that I could do that.
[00:49:14.320]So as we kind of finish out this conversation,
[00:49:17.380]I want you to start thinking about what students have said
[00:49:19.940]about preparing for life after high school.
[00:49:22.460]One of my colleagues and myself did an analysis
[00:49:25.470]of some questions on the post school outcomes survey
[00:49:28.780]which is given to students who have graduated
[00:49:31.430]or left high school.
[00:49:32.950]And it's given one year after.
[00:49:35.400]And those students are assessed on a variety
[00:49:38.000]of different things about life after high school.
[00:49:40.650]And these are students with disabilities.
[00:49:42.940]It is a required survey that's given to all students
[00:49:47.140]or a group of students randomly selected each year.
[00:49:51.750]One of the questions asks:
[00:49:53.080]What are some things that happened in high school
[00:49:55.600]that best helped you get ready for the future?
[00:50:00.690]And these were the things
[00:50:02.010]that students with disabilities said
[00:50:04.050]happened in high school that prepared them best
[00:50:06.150]for life after high school.
[00:50:07.770]And there were five different things
[00:50:09.720]that came up repeatedly across 700 students.
[00:50:12.890]Number five was participation
[00:50:14.660]in some kind of extracurricular activity of interest.
[00:50:17.618]Four, enrollment in an academic class of interest.
[00:50:20.860]So this could be English, math, science,
[00:50:23.440]social studies, band, debate, so forth.
[00:50:27.810]Number three, enrollment in career development coursework.
[00:50:30.880]So that would be work experience
[00:50:32.410]like we've been talking about,
[00:50:33.970]career in tech ed, things like that.
[00:50:36.880]A lot of times they said the CNA course or woodworking,
[00:50:40.990]stuff like that.
[00:50:42.591]Then number two, the second highest repeated item
[00:50:45.670]was what we just talked about:
[00:50:47.640]being able to set goals, persevere,
[00:50:51.920]learn that self-determination
[00:50:54.270]that helped them move forward and make decisions.
[00:50:57.720]And then the number one reason that students
[00:51:00.760]with disabilities said that they were most prepared
[00:51:03.790]for high school was they had a supportive staff member
[00:51:06.670]willing to push them to do their best,
[00:51:10.130]to really push forward and persevere.
[00:51:13.450]So it's important to think about this
[00:51:15.730]from the aspect that they saw very clearly that your work
[00:51:22.200]in influencing these other four pieces and making sure
[00:51:26.330]that they had those opportunities was crucial for them
[00:51:29.950]to be successful as young adults.
[00:51:34.210]We're gonna kind of end with this thought.
[00:51:36.480]So kind of why is this important?
[00:51:38.610]Why is it important for us to be thinking about
[00:51:42.480]all the different aspects of adult life
[00:51:45.190]and how we can prepare students for those activities?
[00:51:49.700]What do they all have in common?
[00:51:51.860]And my assertion would be and what we found in our research
[00:51:56.470]was that this thread of the staff member
[00:52:00.680]was listed most often across one or more of these areas.
[00:52:05.527]And it was almost always a staff member
[00:52:08.320]who was pushing them to persevere,
[00:52:11.240]who was helping them get enrolled
[00:52:13.160]in career assessment courses they were interested in,
[00:52:16.430]who was teaching the academic classes of interest:
[00:52:19.260]the band, the choir, the math, the English.
[00:52:22.880]Or they were coaches and activity sponsors who were involved
[00:52:26.900]in those extracurricular activities of interest.
[00:52:30.360]And while that touches real deeply
[00:52:33.540]on a lot of things related to careers,
[00:52:36.210]it also touches on independent living, community engagement.
[00:52:40.690]Those pieces are all actively involved
[00:52:43.670]in what this particular aspect is of adult life.
[00:52:48.360]If you're involved in all of these things,
[00:52:51.280]your chances of being able to live independently,
[00:52:54.260]be engaged in the community,
[00:52:56.330]and be able to get into paid employment is much greater.
[00:52:59.700]So if you were to walk away and do anything
[00:53:03.010]as that supportive staff member, pick one or more
[00:53:06.020]of these things to really start building it
[00:53:08.960]in the program in your building
[00:53:10.870]so that students have more active participation
[00:53:13.640]in activities and things of interest to them.
[00:53:18.600]So I'm gonna conclude here.
[00:53:21.290]We talked at great length
[00:53:23.190]about the career development steps that you can take.
[00:53:27.330]We also talked about these factors,
[00:53:30.260]factors that influence both employment
[00:53:33.660]and post-secondary ed and training
[00:53:35.690]and then that independent living and community engagement.
[00:53:39.510]I wanna go ahead and conclude and thank all of you
[00:53:42.480]for participating.
[00:53:43.510]And we will be moving into question and answer session
[00:53:47.330]here in just a minute.
[00:53:48.420]Thank you very much.
[00:53:50.030]And I hope that this drew out some questions
[00:53:53.450]that I can be of assistance to answer with you
[00:53:56.640]as we move forward.

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Changing Mindsets to Prepare Students with Disabilities for Integrated Employment and Success in Adult Life

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