Education and career preparation for youth with disabilities

JOURNAL OF ADOLESCENT H E A L T H CARE 1985;6:125-135

Education and Career Preparation for Youth With Disabilities

G. T H O M A S BELLAMYr PH.D.~ BARBARA WILCOX, P H . D . , HEIDI ROSEI P H . D . / A N D

J O H N M C D O N N E L L / P H . D .

Questions about the nature and adequacy of career preparation for youth with disabilities are especially salient today because the developments from research and demonstration efforts have dramatically altered the expectations for their employability. In sharp contrast to the isolated demonstrations of success stand the data on the employment status of adults with disability. Between 50 and 80% of working-age adults who report a disability are jobless (1,2). Although the normal methods of data collection probably result in undercounting employed persons with disabilities (3), similarly high rates of joblessness have been reported in follow-up studies of recent special-education graduates (4,5). Recent data also indicate that individuals served by publicly supported day or vocational services typically receive low wages, make slow progress toward employment, and are segregated from their nondisabled peers (6,7).

High schools and adult services are confronting a changing population. Those adolescents with handicaps now in high schools constitute the first cohort of students who have enjoyed the benefits of the "right to education" legislation. A conservative esti- mate is that these students have had at least seven years of the free public education guaranteed by P.L.

From the College of Education, University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon (G.T.B.), the Division of Special Education and Rehabilitation, University of Oregon, Eugene, Oregon (B.W.), the Evangelische Di- akonie, Bremen, West Germany (H.R.), and the Department of Special Education, Graduate School of Education, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, Utah q.M.).

Address reprint requests to: G. Thomas Bellamy, Ph.D., Director, Specialized Training Program, College of Education, University of Oregon, Room 135, Eugene, OR 97403.

Manuscript accepted November 15, 1984.

94-142. Even presuming only moderate success on the part of the schools, it seems clear that these students should be qualitatively different from earlier generations of individuals with handicaps who might not have had access to educational programs or who might have been served only in institutional settings. As a consequence of their education, today's adolescent with a disability has programmatic needs and adult potential quite different from his/her earlier counterparts.

A final factor that underscores the importance of career preparation is the sheer number of handicapped students entering secondary programs. Whereas in the past there was a high incidence of institutionalization among adolescents with severe disabilities, today these students are being main- tained in public school programs in increasing num- bers. Consequently, not only are today's secondary students more competent, there are more of them.

The combination of technological advances and effective service demonstrations, rising expectations for employment, dissatisfaction with current employment results, and a larger and different student body offer unique opportunities to those responsible for education and career preparation for students with a disability. Taking full advantage of these opportunities will require research support that addresses a broad range of practical service issues.

This paper will review the research implications of several major decisions in the provision of secondary special education and career preparation services for youth with disabilities. The variety of these decisions requires a broad survey approach, rather than an in- depth analysis or theoretical treatment of any particular aspect. To provide a framework for such a survey, we will first propose a way of viewing the out-

© Society for Adolescent Medicine, 1985 125 Published by Elsevier Science Publishing Co., Inc., 52 Vanderbilt Ave., New York, NY 10017 0197-0070/85/$3.30

126 BELLAMY ET AL. JOURNAL OF ADOLESCENT HEALTH CARE Vol. 6, No. 2

comes of education and adult services for persons with disability. Factors affecting how well students achieve these outcomes represent critical decisions that must be made during the service process by the student, by his/her parents and teachers, and by the program administrators.

For our purposes, "youth" will mean individuals in secondary school and in the initial years following the education entitlement. This period is chronologi- cally difficult to define because states differ in the ages at which students enter and leave secondary education. Generally speaking, the period from 14 or 15 years through the early 20s is included. "Dis- ability" will be defined broadly in terms of eligibility for special education, vocational rehabilitation, and other adult services for persons with handicaps. Again, precision is difficult, because the definition of disability that creates access to these special public services changes significantly during the age range addressed by this paper. For persons of school age, disability is defined in relation to education achievement and the need for special services to benefit from schooling. After aging out of the education entitlement, individuals become eligible for services based on definitions of disability that are referenced to the demands of employment and that reflect the capacity to obtain or perform work. Practically, this means that overlapping, but different, groups of youth are considered disabled for the purpose of receiving public services before and after leaving school. This paper will address the special education needs of persons considered disabled by the schools, and will include other groups considered disabled in the dis- cussion of the later transition to employment.

Education and career preparation begin with the earliest schooling and continue throughout life. This paper addresses only that portion of these activities that occur during youth, in the secondary school, and in the transition to work. While education and career preparation during this period encompass activities designed to help students perform ade- quately in many adult roles, our primary focus will be on the preparation for employment.

Goals of Education and Career Preparation Articulating the goals of education is a necessary and difficult task. The existential dilemma experienced by the schools undoubtedly arises from social and economic changes in society at large: the shift from a manufacturing to a service and information economy, the changes in the structure of the family, the astonishing achievements in technology, the general

loss of community, and the pressure from courts and legislatures. As a function of these changes, the public schools have come to be more fully public, to be inclusive rather than exclusive, and, consequently, to serve an extremely diverse student body.

Against this general background of ambiguity, the education goals for students with a disability are perhaps somewhat more clear. Professionals working with individuals with disabilities have adopted the practical philosophy of the career education move- ment that emphasizes the development of know- ledge and skills to enable students to quality for entry-level occupations and to succeed in other nonschool environments (8). Such a view focuses directly on education outcomes and career preparation, i.e., the opportunities, jobs, and social and economic status that identify successful adult living. Successful education and career preparation programs are, in the final analyses, those that produce successful adults.

Although successful adult living is a logical start- ing point for the analysis of education and career preparation, it poses its own problems of definition. Despite important individual differences, it does seem useful to propose minimally acceptable criteria for which schools should strive to achieve for all individuals with a disability. In their roles as agents of acculturation and promoters of individual growth, special education and career preparation should produce adults who can enter the nation's workforce. Minimally adequate education and career preparation will result in qualification for and success in employment.

This emphasis on employment outcomes is not meant as an argument that this is the only important outcome of education and career preparation. The authors have proposed elsewhere that successful secondary special education should lead to adult lives that are independent, productive, and integrated in the community (9). Similar goals are now under consideration, in Senate Bill 2573, as the philo- sophical base for the nation's Developmental Dis- abilities Program.

There are many ways to enter the workforce, and the concern for employment outcomes in education and career preparation is not intended to endorse only traditional work patterns and roles. The great' majority of persons with disabilities should be able to enter full-time, self-supporting employment upon completion of their education. Others, because of their disability, may present excess costs to employers because of reduced productivity levels, greater training needs, or required equipment modi-

March 1985 EDUCATION AND CAREER PREPARATION 127

fications. For these persons, other patterns of employment involving government incentives for employers, ongoing services in the workplace, or wage adjustments to reflect actual productivity may be necessary aspects of employment alternatives. As recent initiatives by the Administration on Develop- mental Disabilities and the Office of Special Educa- tion and Rehabilitative Services suggest, employment alternatives that can accommodate the full spectrum of disability may be increasingly available (10). Given these developments, it appears reason- able to define entry into competitive or supported employment either immediately after completion of school or after a period of postsecondary education as the minimally acceptable outcome of education and career preparation. Competitive .employment outcomes are achieved when jobs paying above the minimum wage allow an individual to be self-supporting, without dependence on social services. Supported employment is achieved when an individual is employed above or below the minimum wage, but requires ongoing public service and support, such as retraining, extra supervision, crisis in- tervention, personal attendants, and so on, to maintain employment. This formulation suggests that long periods of postschool prevocational preparation or nonvocational services represent unacceptable outcomes of education and career preparation. To the extent that competitive or supported employment outcomes are not achieved, one or more parts of the education and career preparation enterprise has failed at either the individual or the system level. We will now turn to an analysis of a few important factors that could contribute to or prevent such failure.

School-Based Education and Career Preparation This section will address the factors in secondary special education that effect the achievement of employment and related outcomes. Three general factors will be examined: 1) what students are taught, 2) how services are organized, and 3) how programs are evaluated.

the curriculum, and the generality of the resulting skills.

1. Curriculum content. Although there are a variety of approaches to the career and vocational education of handicapped students, there is widespread agreement on the student objectives that should characterize a program of preparation focused on employment: 1) acquisition of job skills, 2) development of work support behaviors, 3) choice of a job area, 4) oppgrtunities for job mobility or advancement, and 5) a job itself. An emphasis on these objectives, or consumer benefits, causes any differences between disabled and normal adolescents to disap- pear; the benefits of career preparation for students with disabilities are the same as they are for all other students.

ACQUISITION OF JOB SKILLS. One of the major goals of any work-preparation program, as well as one of the major benefits to participating students, is the learning of work skills themselves. It is necessary to teach students to meet the specific demands of a job: to handle the necessary tools and machinery, to make the discriminations that are basic to job performance, and to perform the component behaviors required by the work task. After training, a student should have some specific skills such as being able to run a dishwasher, use a computer for tool design, or successfully sell housewares.

WORK SUPPORT SKILLS. Effective vocational preparation ensures that students develop the personal and social skills necessary to support performance in the work setting. The literature is replete with data on people losing jobs because they do not get along with coworkers, do not control their behavior, spend too much time off their task, are chronically late or absent, or do not follow instructions (10,12). Al- though these are frequently labeled "prevocational skills," we suggest the term "work-support skills" to describe thi s important class of behavior; we do not, however, imply that they must be mastered before other work skills.

What Students are Taught

Decisions about what students are to be taught clearly affect the probability of work and successful community living after the student leaves the public school system. These decisions comprise at least three major variables: curriculum content and structure, the process of individualize d planning within

CHOICE. A third area of general agreement is that preparation should provide for individual choice. Since there are clearly more types of jobs than any one individual can learn, students must choose among alternatives The benefit for the student is the selection of a particular job or job cluster on which to focus training. After all, until there is a basic decision about what job an individual is preparing for, it is


impossible to begin specific preparation. Choosing to develop work skills in one area precludes the opportunity to develop skills in another area. While this opportunity cost is especially apparent with students with the more severe handicaps who typically require extended training to ~master any one skill or activity, v!rtually all people preparing for employment are fa.ced with the same dilemma. Choos- ing involves decisions not only about what will be done, but about what will not be done. Stated this way, the process of job choice goes well beyond the question of vocational evaluation to consider individual family values and actual job Opportunities.

JOB MOBILITY AND ADVANCEMENT. Most would agree that the fourth goal of preparation is to enhance an individual 's job mobility and advancement. Many people, both disabled and nondisabled, do not keep their first job. Students who have been trained only for one particular job are at a disadvantage for such a transition. Because jobs change over time because of new technology, narrow vocational preparation may render a s tudent 's skills obsolete before he]she even enters the marketplace. A breadth of training that would develop skills across jobs seems to be an importan! objective of the vocational training effort.

JOB PLACEMENT. A placement at the point of grad- uation or as soon after as possible is the most tangible s tudent benefit from vocational preparation. Al- though adult service programs may be available if this objective is not met, the aim of school-based preparation should be placement in a regular employment job that pays wages .

Together, these five components constitute the criteria against which the content of a specific curric- u lum can be evaluated. All five benefits should be available to each s tudent regardless of the level of his/her disability.

Despite the rather broad agreement on the central objectives for special education and career preparation, several curriculum-related barriers confront adolescents with a disability. One of the most significant Of these is the rigid sequencing of curriculum objectives. For example, many curricula stipulate that general work-support skills mus t be mastered before specific work skills are taught. This effectively prevents some students from receiving programming related to all five objectives. The presumpt ion of prerequisites or of a hierarchy of vocational content can restrict s tudent learning opportunities and discriminate against those with more serious learn-

ing problems. A related barrier is the frequent re- striction of on-site work experience placement to students who can learn and perform both work skills and work support behaviors with little instruction beyond that provided by the natural setting itself. This means that individuals requiring additional training or supervision are relegated to Simulated work situations where some critical aspects of a job cannot be practiced. The tendency to focus preparation on the "world of w o r k / ' rather than on specific job s or job dusters, to train to arbitrary educational critera rather than to the standards of the workplace, and to be content with demonstrat ions of skills in isolation constitute additional curriculum barriers to realizing the five objectives. As a result, s t uden t s may be denied the opportuni ty to learn a specific job that is economically viable in their local community, and they may be ill-prepared for the demands of real work settings.

To address these curriculum content barriers, research activities should develop and validate curriculum models that give all s tudents access to programming in all fiv6 objectives. Particular problems currently exist in adjusting curriculum models for students with severe handicaps.

2. Individualization. As a function of PL 94-142, students with disabilities and their parents have a mechanism for individualization. The annual individualized education program (IEP) can reflect differences in instructional content, methods, priority, or criterion for individual students.

In many respects the IEP objectives selected during a s tudent 's high school career willdetermine the employment prospects and the quality of life that he/she may enjoy as an adult. A functional IEP can mean the difference be tween accessing appropriate vocational, residential, and leisure opportunities, or doing nothing at all. The critical nature of the IEP for high school students with disabilities requires a process that considers those family and communi ty resources that will ultimately influence the student 's postschool options and support.

Historically, the selection of IEP targets for high school students was based on assessment of s tudent skills, aptitude, and interest as measured on standardized or criteria-referenced tests. While these in- struments provide some information about the objectives that might enhance a s tudent 's postschool success, they do not allow assessment of variables that are unique to the s tudent 's communi ty and to the family situation. Postschool success for many Students will be determined by the students ' ability


to use the resources available in their own community and by the level of support they receive from family, peers, or agencies in maintaining access to these resources. To some extent, then, individualization should happen at the community level as well as at the student level.

Despite the individual planning process man- dated by P.L. 94-142, there are a number of factors that continue to constrain effective individualization in special education and career preparation. Perhaps the most significant is the lack of systematic transition planning at both the individual and program level. A definition that limits transition to the final year of education eligibility removes the pressure for early planning for postschool opportunities and services and for the accompanying adjustments in family structure or lifestyle. Neglect of the planning process at the systems level may mean that information is not available to make timely adjustments to postschool services. A recent survey shows that rarely is even basic information about the postgradu- ation needs of special education students available to planners and policy makers (13). Unfortunately, this lack of information may result in postschool programs and services that are overcrowded or Simply not available. Graduating from school to a waiting list is too frequently an outcome of such ineffective planning.

A second issue related to individualization that affects the successful achievement of the objectives of vocational preparation is the reluctance of parents to participate in the planning process and the frequent exclusion Of the students from that process. Procedures used in most programs have Shaped parents into passive rather than active participants.

To remediate the shortcomings of the individualization process, research activity Should focus on procedures designed to increase parent involve- ment in, and satisfaction with, the IEP process for their adolescent son or daughter. Models must be created for ensuring that there is sufficient information available so that both parents and program planners can make timely and appropriate decisions about postschool services and opportunities.

Generalized responding. A special problem con- cerning what students learn reflects the extent to which the skills acquired in school are performed elsewhere. Seldom is performance in the training environment the goal of special education; rather, vocational, leisure, and personal management skills are taught with the expectation that they will be performed under different conditions outside school

and after school. From a practical viewpoint, this poses the problem of producing student performance under a variety of different circumstances through training for only one or a few of these pos- sibilities. This issue addresses the optimum allocation of instruction time and resources in school and nOnschool settings, the selection and purpose of instruction materials, and even the design of instruction settings. The assumption that skills acquire in an in-school simulated apartment or in a simulated work station will be performed real, i n nonschool living and work situations is reflected in the considerable funds devoted to such simulated sites. Most commercially available instruction materials reflect similar assumptions about their applicability to other settings. On the other side, several professionals have argued against all in-school simulations, especially for persons with severe handicaps, on the assumption that generalization to natural environments cannot be expected or programmed.

Research is needed to identify which kinds of in- school simulations are effecti-¢e and which are not. While considerable attention has been given to general comparisons of simulated and in vivo instruction, (14,15), few of these comparisons have at- tempted to identify specific characteristics of simulations that produce responses that can be generalized. An important exception is the work of Horner and his colleagues (16,17). Related research is needed to develop practical measures of instruction efficiency that combine the cost of instruction factors with the resulting breadth of generalized responding. It appears to require more time and money to produce responding across different circumstances than to develop competence in single situations. Adequate measures of the associated costs and benefits would greatly assist in making decisions in IEP meetings about the targeted range of competence.

Assuming that effective procedures can be identified for producing generalized responding from a few, possibly simulated, instruction instances, research and development efforts are needed to re- evaluate most existing curricula. As alternative curricula begin to incorporate the results of research such as that reported by Horner et al. (16,18,19), the curriculum production and validation efforts will become critical.

How Services are Organized

Successful high school programs for adolescents with a disability depend on factors other than curriculum and instruction technology. There is a set of


decisions, typically beyond the direct control of either parents or the direct service staff, that affects a program's ability to realize the valued outcomes of vocation preparatiOn. Decisions about the iocationof education services for handicapped adolescents, the nature and extent of the capital investment in instruction equipment or physical facilities, the structure of the school day and the length of the school year, and the pattern of program staffing all influence the extent to which a program will be effective.

Most organizational variables derive their importance from how they mediate other program variables. For example, the physical location of a program will influence whether or not Students with a disability, actually practice social interaction with nonhandicapped individuals. Housing a career and vocational program in a facility serving only individuals with a handicap may enable students to practice work skills, but it may effectively prevent them from experiencing the natural Social contingencies that would maintain performance in a regular work environment. Significant financial commitments for equipment or a physical plant dramatically increase the probability that instruction will be designed around the equipment, and that training will only take place in that specialized--often segregated-- facility. Staffing decisions determine how many staff will be available to a program, what the composite of skills among the staff will be, and how the staff will be deployed in day-to-day instruction. The structure of the school day and the school year, combined with staffing, affects the success of Career and vocation preparation to the extent that they influence student instruction time. District procedures regarding transportation and liability directly effect the probability of schools operating active programs of training in the community and on the job site.

A full range of organizational variables pos e barriers to effective preparation. Perhaps foremost among these is the high rate of segregation of adolescents with disability, especially those with more severe handicaps. In many areas, special schools or special high schools are the primary service delivery format. Such arrangements present serious barriers to students with a disability a n d tO their teachers. From the teacher's perspective, a segregated setting restricts access to a population of nonhandicapped peer tutors who are often invaluable resources for individualized instruction (20). From the students" perspective, segregation restricts opportunities for meaningful interpersonal contact with normal peers and for the building of a social network that might assist the transition to postschool life.

More subtle Segregation of students into specialized vocational training schools or CentersRdis- proportionately attended by disadvantaged and mi- n0rity students--similarly restricts social interac- tionS and may have the equally deleterious effect of exposing students to tools and machines that are out of date compared to those in the actual work place.

In a very real sense, the instruction materials marketplace itself presents a significant barrier to effective vocation preparation. Publishers who advertise vocational training curricula for the handicapped "'ages three through adulthood" or suggest that packaged materials necessarily prepare students for positions in the local economy block efforts to devise age-appropriate training materials and remove needed pressures to train students on actual jobs in the community.

While there are certainly controversies regarding the delivery of related services (especially communication, occupational, and physical therapies), the organization of related service can constitute a major obstacle to effective career and vocation preparation. Traditional models of direct therapy not only isolate communication, motor, or mobility problems from the natural context, but also expend valuable person- nel resources that might otherwise be used to support work training in the community.

The need for research on aspects of program organization is substantial. Information regarding the effects of alternate staffing patterns on instruction delivery might help programs plan and deploy resources more appropriately. A research and development need common to students with disabilities and their families is for summer programs that support students in jobs. Longitudinal Studies of the effects of school integration on students with disability and on nonhandicapped peer tutors are needed. On a smaller schle, there is the need for research and development on classroom-level systems for managing peer ttltors, classroom staff, and staff at work-training siteS, as well as for monitoring student programs and for tracking.

Program Evaluation The need to evaluate special education programs is obvious. Policy makers at the federal, state, and local level need information on the effectiveness of the various programs to make informed decisions regarding their funding and regulations; program administrators need information about the impact of current procedures and service delivery structures; teachers require timely information on individual


student progress, the efficiency of classroom organization, and overall program effectiveness; and final- ly, consumers, parents, and the community at large need evaluation data to make informed choices regarding enrollment and funding. Because regular access to evaluation data gives interested groups the opportunity to respond to education and career preparation programs, the procedures and instru- ments used to collect evaluation data can be factors that affect program success. There are three levels of evaluation, each providing information on different outcomes.

Follow-up studies. When performance in a subse- quent environment is the goal of education, observ- ing the status of program graduates in the environments is a logical dependent variable. Follow-up studies typically involve tracking systems or surveys that generate records of graduates' adult status. For example, the National Center for Research in Voca- tional Education (21) located 232 reports of follow-up studies addressing the employment effects of public vocational education. The combined results of these studies were inconclusive, thus illustrating both the potential and the weakness of follow-up data.

As a means to investigate the effect of a particular treatment approach, follow-up studies are fraught with problems. Random assignment to treatment and control groups is usually both practically and politically impossible, thus making attributions of differences in follow-up data difficult. Equally prob- lematic are efforts to isolate the effects of a particular variable. The fact that many studies have not de- tected consistent employment and earning advantages for vocational education graduates may be because of labor market factors and adult service availability, rather than deficiencies in the vocation preparation programs.

When follow-up data are used in a less experimen- tal fashion to provide regular feedback to decision makers, the value of the data may be considerably greater. Follow-up studies would be most useful to policy makers if relatively simple information were collected on a regular basis and aggregated both within and across school jurisdictions.

Student achievement or change measures. Regular education scores from standardized and criteria-referenced achievement tests are widely used as indica- tors of program effectiveness. There appear to be no measures in secondary special education analogous to SAT scores. There is, however, a need to monitor the effect of schooling on individual students and to

identify appropriate outcome measures that can be taken while the student is being educated.

Student progress is measured only poorly, if at all, by paper and pencil tests, by performance on simulated tasks, or by the achievement of IEP goals that focus only on classroom performance. It thus seems better to evaluate school effectiveness by examining student life outside the school-controlled environment and determining whether performance in that environment has improved as a function of instruction or noninstruction strategies originating from the school system. Research to assist such an evaluation strategy would focus on the development of instru- ments to measure changes in student life-style out of school.

Since every student 's program in special education is designed through an IEP, evaluation of IEP progress might appear to be an appropriate measure of school success. However, simply mastering IEP goals and objectives is not sufficient because they vary so widely in scope and relevance. For adequate measurement, quality dimensions for IEP goals must be delineated, ~ and existing goals must be compared to some quality criteria. One research focus for school effectiveness evaluation could involve estab- lishing an agreement on the quality features of the program and the means by which their presence could be confirmed. When such an agreement is identified, data sources could be identified and evaluation schedules set so as to allow maintenance and repair of the quality programs.

Measures of classroom operations. Classroom opera- tion measures address only the processes, not the outcomes, of the school program. These measures are furthest removed from the actual outcomes of schooling, and they cannot stand alone without a reference to the eventual student outcome.

The single process measure that has been shown to have a functional relationship with change in student behavior is classroom time spent engaged in instruction (22,23). A measure of the amount of time that was adequate for older students with a disability and that was feasible for programs involving out-of- school training would provide important evaluation data for the program.

Other process measures deal with the daily orga~ nizational needs of operating a complex program that requires that the teacher not only instruct, but also recruit, train, plan, organize, schedule, report, and supervise. To assess the effectiveness of classroom management procedures, a program manager needs to move through the same sequence of steps as


in any other evaluation activity: define objectives, design a measurement system, set a standard for exemplary performance, provide frequent information on the relationship between actual performance and objectives, and adjust management activities to maintain or achieve the desired performance. Re- search and development activities are needed to produce workable procedures for systematic management and evaluation of classroom operations.

Postschool Services and Opportunities While the preparation received in high school has much to do with the quality of employment and adult living, it does not by itself determine how an individual will fare after completing school. What- ever expertise, personal contacts, and support networks result from schooling, success in employment and other aspects of adult life reflect the contributions of at least two additional factors: the employment opportunities available and the postsecondary services and experiences that help individuals take advantage of those opportunities.

Work Opportunities The opportunities for persons with disabilities to enter the labor force are determined by several factors. The overall state of the economy no doubt affects this group as it does all potential workers. Job discrimination, structural unemployment among specific pop- ulations, and population demographics also effect work opportunities for all individuals. To appreciate the impact of opportunity limitations on employment outcomes for persons with disabilities, it is helpful to distinguish between the opportunities available to a single individual and those available to the entire disabled population. Individual job opportunities may be affected by the time and effort spent in job searching, the quality and relevance of the preparation to the local job market, and the support network that results from personal contacts. The overall result of these activities, however, may simply be changes in how the jobs available to persons with disabilities are distributed, not an expansion of the total job pool. The size of the pool of available jobs represents a quite different issue. High joblessness persists among persons with disabilities despite extensive federal and state efforts during the last few decades to improve individual employment status. Present definitions of disability and data collection methods make it almost impossible to determine

what proportion of this joblessness can be attributed to individual disability and what proportion results from job discrimination, structural unemployment, and other factors that limit opportunities for disabled persons (3). To whatever extent this joblessness can be attributed to constraints on the total pool of job opportunities, employment outcomes for persons with disabilities will reflect the existence of policies and programs that attempt to equalize the distribu- tion of work opportunities.

Several barriers associated with opportunities and opportunity creation schemes could affect the employment outcomes experienced by persons with disabilities. The most obvious barrier is the lack of data collection on employment outcomes. The definition of disability in relation to work makes it almost impossible to determine the extent of discrimination or structural employment problems at a policy level. This then contributes to the second barrier, which is the general perception that joblessness among the disabled can be attributed primarily to the effects of individual impairments, and, consequently, that the appropriate focus of public funds should be on service provision to prepare individuals for employment. A third barrier may result from minimum wage laws. There are, no doubt, many individuals with disabilities who can work reliably but whose total output in their job may be less than is eco- nomical at the statutory minimum wage. Of course, provisions have been made for subminimum wages, but these waivers have been used principally in sheltered workshops, rather than in regular places of employment.

Each of these barriers suggests several directions for research. Studies are needed to identify the rela- tive contributions to disability joblessness of the disability itself, service quality, and opportunity. Also needed are identification and development of incentives and sanctions for employers that increase the overall pool of job opportunities for the disabled. Additional research needs to include 1) the identification of the perceived and actual excess costs of employing persons with various disabilities so that a complete range of possible incentives can be struc- tured; 2) studies of the possible effects of various patterns of public investment in opportunity creation and service provision to determine the mix that appears most beneficial to persons with a disability; and 3) the identification of the range of incentives and sanctions that are possible at each level of government, including tax incentives, priority access to government work, regulation, and regulation reductions.


Employment-related Services

Several postsecondary services have emerged to help individuals with disabilities take advantage of available employment opportunities. These have been usefully grouped by Will (24) into three broad kinds of programs: 1) those that provide assistance only through services that are available to every cit- izen; 2) those that provide time-limited services designed to lead to independent employment; and 3) those that provide ongoing services. Each of these services provides advantages and barriers for the disabled, and each points to important areas for research.

Generic services. Included in this group are services and experiences that are available equally to persons with disabilities and to the general public. The primary provider i~f these services are postsecondary education programs including vocational technical schools, community colleges, and four- year colleges and universities. Most persons with disabilities probably progress from school to employment using this kind of service in conjunction with the family and neighborhood networks that are often helpful in locating employment. The most fa- miliar set of barriers that may be encountered in postsecondary educa~on include access to and accommodation in regular courses of instruction. The removal of architectural impediments, the alteration of student evaluation procedures, the provision of interpreters, and the development of related sup- ports in housing, transportation, and personal care are problems that have been addressed in major colleges and universities for some years. Additional barriers may be present for persons with mild educational handicaps for whom special courses may be more appropriate than accommodation within the existing curriculum. These individuals often face either an absence of relevant courses or a severely limited selection that addresses only independent-living skills or isolated work skills. Programs that provide comprehensive preparation for entry-level jobs are rare.

Research is needed to provide the program development to define, install, and replicate successful postsecondary programs for the learning disabled and those with other mild educational handicaps. Of particular importance is the development of comprehensive courses that prepare individuals to obtain and maintain employment and that assume respon- sibility for employment placement at the conclusion of the course. Research could also be useful in ad-

dressing ways to disseminate information on effective accommodations in regular higher-education programs.

Time-limited disability services. Time-limited services encompass most of the traditional vocational services to which individuals gain entry because of their disability: vocational rehabilitation, postsecondary vocational education, and other job-training programs. The shared purpose of these programs is to provide the services needed for an individual to enter employment, at which time services are termi- nated and are considered to have been successful. The programs are not time-limited in any arbitrary way, but rather are only limited by their mission of providing services that will lead to independent employment status in the future.

The primary barrier confronting persons with disabilities who use time-limited services is the local availability of the best practice services. In the last decade, rapid progress has been made in designing effective job training and placement programs, thus leading the National Governors' Association (25) to conclude that the vocational services needed by practically any person with a disability probably existed somewhere. Unfortunately, a particular service is just as likely to be unavailable when and where it is needed. This implies that the primary research need is for the use or institutionalization of innovations in the regular practice of vocational service agencies. A second research need relates to the development of procedures to extend time-limited services to persons with more severe disabilities. While most of these programs are designed for persons who are believed to be employable after a period of training, such employability is at least in part determined by the type of service received. More effective job training and placement procedures could reduce the number of persons needing ongoing services. Other research might address the optimal allocation of scarce resources in timeqimited services. The current policy of giving priority vocational rehabilitation services to persons with severe disabilities who meet the employability criterion still occasions debate. While several analyses of the costs and benefits of possible priorities have appeared, these have not typically addressed the public costs of the alternate services needed by those not included in vocational programs.

Ongoing services. Some persons with disabilities require enduring, often life-long, services after leaving school. An imminent increase in this population


can be attributed to Public Law 94-142. This law has served as a year-by-year deinstitutionalization effort, with parents choosing to keep their children with severe disabilities at home. The first school genera- tion after the "right to education" legislation is now beginning to age out of their education entitlement, and they are creating a greatly expanded need for adult services organized to provide ongoing support. Today, ongoing services are financed primarily through Medicaid long-term-care funds, through the Social Service Block Grants, and through state appro- priations. Services are delivered at the local level in day activity, day habilitation, and work activities programs.

The primary barrier associated with these programs is their predominant focus on nonvocational and prevocational services as a result of either federal and state regulation or program practice. As they are now organized in most states, these programs do not provide either the benefits of employment or a real- istic expectation of moving to higher level programs where those benefits might be obtained (6). If persons with severe disabilities are to achieve employment outcomes as adults, alternatives to this nonvocational services system are needed. Simply gaining access to services may constitute an additional barrier, given the rapid demand for service that must be expected in the next few years.

The research needs in this area are for the development and replication of program approaches that combine ongoing services with work opportunities. Of particular importance will be programs that provide wage-generating work in regular, integrated work settings, rather than in traditionally segregated activity programs. As these programs become available for study, alternative payment mechanisms need to be evaluated including the ongoing support provided by community-based service organiza- tions, employers, and coworkers. Existing program models have provided employment opportunities only in limited sectors of the labor market, and they should be adjusted for other, more varied, kinds of work. Program evaluations are needed that address the assumptions underlying the current nonvocational focus of important funding for ongoing services including the relationship between supported employment, health status, individual development, and the consumption of public services.

References 1. u.s. Commission on Civil Rights. Accommodating the spec-

trum of disabilities. Washington: Author, 1983.

2. U.S. Bureau of the Census. Labor force status and other characteristics of persons with a work disability. Washington: Au- thor, 1982.

3. Gliedman J, Roth W. The unexpected minority: Handicapped children in America. New York: Harcourt, Brace & Jovano- vich, 1980.

4. Brodsky M. Post-high school experiences of graduates with severe handicaps. Eugene, OR: University of Oregon, un- published doctoral dissertation, 1983.

5. Hasazi S. Post-school employment status of handicapped youth. Paper presented to the Rehabilitative Services Admin- istration, Region 3, Conference on Transitional Programming, Philadelphia, PA: February, 1984.

6. Bellamy GT, Rhodes LE, Bourbeau PE, Mank DM. Mental retardation services in sheltered workshops and day activity programs: Consumer outcomes and policy alternatives. Paper presented at the National Working Conference on Vocational Services and Employment Opportunities, sponsored by the President's Committee on Mental Retardation, the President's Committee on Employment of the Handicapped, and the As- sociation for Retarded Citizens, Madison, WI, 1982.

7. U.S. Department of Labor. Study of handicapped clients in sheltered workshops. Volume II. Washington: U.S. Depart- ment of Labor, 1979.

8. Brolin D, Kokaska C. Career education for handicapped children and youth. Columbus, OH: Charles E. Merrill, 1979.

9. Wilcox B, Bellamy GT. Design of high school programs for severely handicapped students. Baltimore: Paul H. Brookes, 1982.

10. Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services. Sup- ported employment for adults with severe disabilities: An OSERS program initiative. Washington: Author, 1983.

11. Sali J, Amir M. Personal factors influencing the retarded person's success at work: A report from Israel. Am J Ment Defic 1971;76:42-47.

12. Rusch FR, Schutz RP. Vocational and social work behavior research: An evaluative review. In: JL Mattson, JR McCartney, eds. Handbook of behavior modification with the mentally retarded. New York: Plenum, 1984.

13. McDonnell JJ, Wilcox B, Boles SM. Transition of severely handicapped students from school to adult services: A survey of the states. Eugene, OR: Specialized Training Program, Uni- versity of Oregon, 1984.

14. Marchetti AG, McCartney JR, Drain S, Hooper M, Dix J. Pe- destrian skills training for mentally retarded adults: Com- parison of training in two settings. Ment Retard 1983;21:107- 10.

15. Mattson J. Preventing home accidents: A training program for the retarded. Behavior Modification 1980;4:397-410.

16. Sprague JR, Horner RH. The effects of single instance, multi- ple instance and general case training on generalized vending machine use by moderately and severely handicapped students. J Appl Behav Anal 1984;17:273-8.

17. McDonnell JJ, Horner RH, Williams JA. Acomparison ofthree strategies for teaching generalized grocery purchasing to high school students with severe handicaps. Journal of the Associa- tion for the Severely Handicapped, 1984, in press.

18. Homer RH, McDonald RS. A comparison of single instance and general case instruction in teaching a generalized vocational skill. Journal of the Association for the Severely Handi- capped 1982;7:7-20.

19. Sprague JR, Homer RH. The effects of single instance, multi- ple instance training on generalized vending machine use by moderately and severely handicapped students. J Appl Behav Anal 1984;17:273-8.


20. Fenrick NJ, MCDonnell JJ. Junior high school s~dents as teachers of the severely retarded: Training and generaiization. Education and Training of the Mentally Retarded 1980;15:187- 94.

2i. Mertens DM, McElwain D, Garcia G, Whitmore M. The effects of participating in vocational education. Columbus: The Na- ti0naI Center for ResearCh in Vocational and Technical Educa- tion, Ohio state University, 1980.

22. Fredericks HD, Anderson R, Baldwin V, The identification of competencies of teachers of the severely handicapped. AAESPH Review 1979;4:81-95.

23. Rosenshine BV, Berliner DC. Academic engaged time. British Journal of Teacher Education 1978;4:3-16.

24. Will M. Bridges from school to working life. Programs for the handicapped. Washington: Clearinghouse on the Handi- capped, March/April, 1984.

25. NatiOnal Governor's Association. Employment and training of handicapped youth. Washington, D.C., 1980.

Documents

Education and career preparation for youth with disabilities