Individuals with disabilities education improvement act of 2004 noncompliance determination complaints in commonwealth states

Progress toward competitive integrated employment (CIE) for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) over the last 40 years has been mixed. Despite evidence showing that supported employment interventions can enable adults with IDD to effectively get and keep jobs, national rates of integrated employment remain below a third of the working-age population. Progress is being made to improve these outcomes. Pathways have been identified that lead to CIE through supported employment, customized employment, internship experiences, and postsecondary education. The recent passage of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) has created fresh momentum and increased the onus on interagency collaboration. This article examines what is known about promoting CIE through these pathways and highlights recommendations for future research and policy change. Recommendations for the future provide direction toward positive change for CIE into the 21st century.

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Toward Competitive Employment for Persons with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities: What Progress Have We Made and Where Do We Need to Go:

BACKGROUND: The federal government has invested billions of dollars to promote employment for adults with intellectual disabilities. Despite this investment, the employment rate within this population has remained stable during the recent decades. OBJECTIVE: The objective of this study is to identify characteristics of adults with intellectual disabilities who are employed, and to understand the paths towards employment for these individuals. METHODS: Respondents included a nationally representative sample of 1,055 parents/guardians of adult children (21 years of age or older) with an intellectual disability surveyed by Gallup. These parents/guardians were selected from approximately 341,000 households screened by Gallup. This methodology allowed for the inclusion of a sample of adults with ID who had never been in the labor force or even sought employment. RESULTS: Several characteristics are associated with greater likelihood of employment, including younger age, early work experience, higher levels of adaptive behavior, and absence of emotional and behavioral problems. These characteristics are especially predictive of employment in a competitive setting, and relatively less predictive of sheltered employment. There is very little movement between the two types of employment settings: very few people currently in competitive employment ever worked in a sheltered setting. CONCLUSIONS: The results from this study have clear implications for policies and programs. Young adults with intellectual disabilities need early opportunities to work in community settings. These community-based experiences must provide them with the opportunity to develop necessary adaptive, behavioral, and emotional skills. Finally, policy makers must recognize that sheltered employment is not a stepping-stone to employment in a competitive setting.

Pathways to employment: A national survey of adults with intellectual disabilities

The expectations of parents can shape the post-school pathways of young people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). Yet little is known about how parents view the employment prospects and priorities of their sons and daughters after high school. We examined expectations, preferences, and concerns of 1,065 parents of children and youth with IDD (below age 22) related to outcomes after leaving high school. We found parents prioritized paid community employment over sheltered options, valued qualitative aspects of the workplace (e.g., personal fit and interaction opportunities) over common employment outcome metrics (e.g., pay and hours), and held substantial concerns about their child’s future employment success. We found that multiple factors shaped parental expectations and the extent to which their daughters or sons accessed early career development experiences. We offer recommendations for research and practice aimed at raising expectations for and access to community employment for y...

The Voices of Parents Post–High School Expectations, Priorities, and Concerns for Children With Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities

Background
Obtaining employment is among the most important ambitions of people with intellectual disability. Progress towards comprehensive inclusive employment is hampered by numerous barriers. Limited research is available on these barriers and strategies to overcome them.

Method
A mixed method approach in a sample of 30 HR-managers was used to assess (i) differences in perceived barriers for employment of people with specific disabilities and mental disorders; (ii) barriers specific to employing people with intellectual disability; (iii) strategies to overcome these barriers.

Results
Employers perceive more barriers for hiring people with intellectual disability and mental disorders than for physical disabilities. Employment for this population is hampered by a perceived lack of skills and legal issues. Strategies perceived as beneficial are supplying information, changes in organizational strategies and legal changes.

Conclusions
Employers’ differentiated expectations and reservations towards hiring individuals with specific disabilities need to be taken into account to increase employment for people with intellectual disability.

The Employers' perspective on barriers and facilitators to employment of people with intellectual disability: A differential mixed-method approach.

BACKGROUND: Employment has been recognized as an important goal for improving the quality of life of adults with intellectual disabilities (ID). Governments at both the federal and state level have invested billions of dollars to encourage better outcomes for adults with ID as they transition out of high school and into the labor force. OBJECTIVE: Given these important efforts, this study documented the employment situation of working-aged adults with intellectual disabilities across the country. METHODS: Respondents included a nationally representative random sample of 1,017 parents/guardians of adult children (21 years of age or older) with an intellectual disability surveyed by Gallup. These parents/guardians were selected from approximately 341,000 households screened by Gallup. This methodology allowed for the inclusion of a sample of adults with ID who had never been in the labor force or even sought employment. RESULTS: The results indicate a troublingly low employment rate for adults with ID and a puzzlingly low number who are even in the labor force. CONCLUSIONS: The employment outlook for adults with ID will continue to be bleak until new ways are found to meaningfully incorporate this population into the labor force.

National snapshot of adults with intellectual disabilities in the labor force

1 Center for Social Development and Education, University of Massachusetts, Boston, MA 2 The Romano Group, Ellicott City, MD 3 Center for Survey Research, University of Massachusetts, Boston, MA * Please address correspondence to Gary N. Siperstein, Center for Social Development and Education, University of Massachusetts Boston, 100 Morrissey Blvd., Boston, MA, 02125. Tel.: 617 287 7250; E-mail: gary.siperstein@umb.edu. The American Public’s Perception of Illegal Steroid Use

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The American Public’s Perception of Illegal Steroid Use: A National Survey, 2013

Abstract When memories share similar features, this can lead to interference, and ultimately forgetting. With experience, however, interference can be resolved. This raises the important question of how memories change, with experience, to minimize interference. Intuitively, interference might be minimized by increasing the precision and accuracy of memories. However, recent evidence suggests a potentially adaptive role for memory distortions. Namely, similarity can trigger exaggerations of subtle differences between memories (repulsion). Here, we tested whether repulsion specifically occurs on feature dimensions along which memories compete and whether repulsion is predictive of reduced memory interference. To test these ideas, we developed synthetic faces in a two-dimensional face space (affect and gender). This allowed us to precisely manipulate similarity between faces and the feature dimension along which faces differed. In three experiments, participants learned to associate faces with unique cue words. Associative memory tests confirmed that when faces were similar (face pairmates), this produced interference. Using a continuous face reconstruction task, we found two changes in face memory that preferentially occurred along the feature dimension that was “diagnostic” of the difference between face pairmates: (1) there was a bias to remember pairmates with exaggerated differences (repulsion) and (2) there was an increase in the precision of feature memory. Critically, repulsion and precision were each associated with reduced associative memory interference, but these were statistically dissociable contributions. Collectively, our findings reveal that similarity between memories triggers dissociable, experience-dependent changes that serve an adaptive role in reducing interference. 

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Max Drascher

Papers

National snapshot of adults with intellectual disabilities in the labor force

The American Public’s Perception of Illegal Steroid Use: A National Survey, 2013

Long-term memory interference is resolved via repulsion and precision along diagnostic memory dimensions