Seeding Change

Partner Spotlight: Alliance for Full Participation

2010-10-18T13:11:00.001-04:00

The Alliance for Full Participation (AFP) is a collaboration of states and organizations that seek to ensure that people with developmental disabilities have the opportunity to be included, integrated, independent, and productive community members. AFP has a strong vision for employment equity in competitive jobs with competitive wages, raised expectations surrounding employment, and job satisfaction and retention among people with development disabilities. This commitment includes the "Real Jobs: It's Everyone's Business" Campaign, which seeks to double the employment rate of people with disabilities by 2015. A summit will be held in Washington, D.C. in November 2011 to mark the midpoint in the campaign and bring together the various stakeholders involved in the movement. Central to the work of AFP are state-level partners and state team members, including people with developmental disabilities, their employers, coworkers and families, business organizations, community members, service providers, government representatives, and advocates. Karen Flippo, the State Team Liaison for AFP, spoke with the NTAR Leadership Center about the "Real Jobs" campaign.

Listen to the podcast with Karen Flippo, State Teams Liaison, Alliance for Full Participation
Read a transcript of the podcast
Learn more about the November 2011 summit
Find out more about your state AFP team

Strategy Spotlight: Registered Apprenticeships

2010-10-04T13:07:00.002-04:00

Registered Apprenticeships (RA) combine on the job training with classroom style education to provide a full skill set necessary to succeed at a particular career. The U.S. Department of Labor's (USDOL) RA program offers a training path to over 1,000 different careers in a wide variety of sectors - from the more traditional apprenticeship style fields such as a carpentry and electrical work to law enforcement and healthcare. Realizing the opportunity this kind of program could create for youth with disabilities, the USDOL's Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP) awarded cooperative agreements in September 2009 to The Workplace, Inc. of Bridgeport, Connecticut and the SkillSource Group, Inc. of Vienna, Virginia to provide RA programs for youth with disabilities. The NTAR Leadership Center sat down with Nestor Leon, Assistant Vice President of Programs at The WorkPlace, Inc. to discuss their efforts with this cooperative agreement and their experiences providing RA to youth with disabilities.

Listen to the podcast with Nestor Leon, Assistant Vice President of Programs, The WorkPlace, Inc.
Read a transcript of the podcast

State Spotlight: Ohio

2010-08-09T11:00:00.001-04:00

Ohio has been actively exploring ways to implement universal design principles to improve the state's workforce development system, including education and training services, to better meet the diverse needs of job seekers and adult learners, whether they are adults with disabilities, older workers, TANF recipients or others. In May, the NTAR Leadership Center and the Ohio Initiative for Persons with Learning Disabilities facilitated an event, for the state's Adult Basic and Literary Education (ABLE) program, Rehabilitative Services Commission and Job and Family Services staff that introduced them to the concept of Universal Design and its application for adult learners and job seekers. The Program Manager of Ohio's Disability Program Navigator Initiative, Gwen Ivory, and Sharon Reynolds, the Director of Ohio's Center/Southeast ABLE Resource Center at the Edward Stevens Center for the Development of Literacy and Language, both sat down with the NTAR Leadership Center to discuss their state's work with Universal Design.

Listen to the podcast with Gwen Ivory, Disability Program Navigator
Read a transcript of the podcast

Partner Spotlight: National Network of Sector Partners

2010-08-02T11:00:00.001-04:00

Sector initiatives are industry-specific approaches to workforce development and economic development for creating jobs as well as career pathways for job seekers in a particular industry. Sector initiatives generally work with a group of employers in a focused industry, use workforce intermediaries to facilitate the development of workforce solutions to meet employee needs, and work to promote long-standing change that can benefit the industry by providing skilled workers and benefit both the community and workers by providing good jobs. The National Network of Sector Partners (NNSP), the only membership organization in the country to promote sector initiatives, has been working to improve regional economies and enhance employment opportunities for low-income individuals through the promotion of sector initiatives. Under the leadership of Jack Mills, Director of the National Network of Sector Partners (NNSP), and an NTAR Leadership Center Research Advisory Panel member , NNSP is strengthening the sector field by expanding the knowledge base of sector initiatives, advocating for policy support for sector initiatives at the state level, developing new funding models, and exploring new models of sector initiatives. Mr. Mills spoke with us about the benefits of sector initiatives and his work at NNSP.

Listen to the podcast with Jack Mills, Director, NNSP
Read a transcript of the podcast

Unfinished Business: The ADA Turns 20

2010-07-16T12:37:00.002-04:00

This is a guest post from Jeffrey Stoller, Director of Communications and Outreach, John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development.

On July 26, the nation will mark the 20th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) being signed into law. It is rightly celebrated as a landmark civil rights bill that has benefited Americans both with and without disabilities.

Looking back over the past two decades, however, it is clear that removing physical barriers to work has not led automatically to meaningful employment opportunities for jobseekers with disabilities. In fact, a June 2010 report by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics found that less than 22% of working age Americans with disabilities participate in the current labor force – compared to 70% of those without disabilities.

It seems that the ADA’s success in improving access to workplaces has not guaranteed access to work itself. Assistive technology has helped people with disabilities connect with essential business equipment and information, and ADA design standards have brought ramps, automatic doors and wider corridors to new and renovated buildings nationwide. Yet, far too few jobseekers with marketable skills are being hired.

The issue of finding job opportunities for people with disabilities has become a greater challenge as a “jobless recovery” threatens to emerge from the country’s troubled economy. The scarcity of available jobs has occurred just as the ADA Amendments of 2008 are increasing the number of employees and jobseekers officially defined as “disabled.”

Persistent obstacles to disability employment. A recent review of the ADA’s impact on employment by Rebecca Hastings of the Society for Human Resource Management (SHRM) warned that many employers may still have an exaggerated sense of the cost of accommodating employees with disabilities. Companies are particularly uneasy about dealing with mental disabilities, or less obvious physical impairments. Others assume that ADA regulations will subject them to discrimination lawsuits for any business decision that adversely impacts their employees.

Interestingly, employers themselves acknowledge that supervisor confusion over ADA accommodation requirements and a failure to recognize a disabled person’s true skill levels are leading barriers to employing job candidates with disabilities. These problems, highlighted in a 2006 study of “Employer ADA Response” by Dr. Susanne Bruyere and colleagues at Cornell University, were especially common in small firms which serve as the leading source of new jobs created within the U.S. economy.

Weak enforcement of ADA employment provisions. The slow progress in increasing employment opportunities for people with disabilities since 1990 may also be traced to a failure to distribute adequate information to covered employers or enforce the laws by government. As the Cornell study suggests, employers of all sizes report a need for more information on complying with ADA provisions, particularly those on how to properly accommodate disabled workers and jobseekers.

At the same time, jobseekers complain that governments have failed to devote sufficient resources to enforcing the employment discrimination laws and other regulations that make workplaces more accessible. For example, inadequate transportation for disabled commuters was a recently highlighted in the Boston Globe (June 28, 2010) in an article describing the failure of local police to ticket drivers who block access to bus stops.

What can be done to make the ADA a more effective tool for promoting disability employment? After 20 years, there is still a compelling need for disability groups to work more closely with employers to explain the relevant laws and encourage ways to introduce workers with disabilities into the incumbent workforce. Internships and programs that train jobseekers in high-demand skills are among the joint projects that employers and advocates can pursue together in order to give businesses the talent they are seeking. Clearly, there are many more years ahead before the ADA’s promise can be fully realized.

State Spotlight: Alaska

2010-06-18T09:21:00.003-04:00

The State of Alaska Governor’s Council on Disabilities and Special Education is undertaking a number of promising and innovative initiatives to increase the employment of people with disabilities throughout the state, including a customized entrepreneurship project, START-Up/Alaska (part of the START-Up/USA Initiative). Governor’s Council Executive Director Millie Ryan has over 20 years of experience in disability employment and has previously worked in the vocational rehabilitation field for the state and for multiple nonprofits that provide residential and vocational services to people with disabilities. She spoke with the NTAR Leadership Center about Alaska’s experiences.

Listen to the podcast with Millie Ryan, Executive Director, Alaska Governor’s Council on Disabilities and Special Education
Read a transcript of the podcast
Follow the Governor’s Council on Disabilities and Special Education on Twitter
Read more about START-Up/Alaska

Consider the Possibilities of Social Media

2010-06-16T10:49:00.006-04:00

This is a guest post from Robb C. Sewell-Wolff, Senior Writer/Editor, John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development, Rutgers University

A few months ago, my colleague Savannah Barnett talked about some of the myths surrounding social media and highlighted the value and benefits of social media tools such as LinkedIn, Twitter, and Facebook. Hopefully, you’ve taken her words to heart and have braved this new frontier, perhaps poked your toes into what might have been uncharted waters, or maybe even immersed yourself completely in the revolution that is social media.

But what can you use social media to accomplish? In the first part of a two-part blog, I’m going to touch upon five things that you can use social media to do. Then, next week, I’ll follow up with a second blog that looks at a nonprofit organization that is doing amazing things with social media.

So…what can you do with social media?

1. You can start conversations.

Social media isn’t only about you spouting your ideas, thoughts, or opinions. In fact, social media works best when it creates a dialogue between people. It not only allows you the chance to be heard, but gives others the opportunity to let their voices be heard as well. It gives everyone the chance to contribute their opinions and knowledge to a discourse.

2. You can change conversations.

My friends on Facebook will often apologize for “hijacking” a thread I created — that is, taking the conversation off subject into different directions. But that is the beauty of social media. You can be talking about health care reform one minute, and then a dozen exchanges later, the subject has morphed into a discussion about the oil leak in the Gulf of Mexico. Don’t get frustrated if your discussion goes off tangent. Accept it and let the conversations flow naturally. The results may be unexpected and quite rewarding.

3. You can network with others.

Social media allows you the chance to interact with individuals you might never typically encounter. I’m living proof of that fact. Aside from my career at the Heldrich Center, I’m a fiction writer. And I’ve used social media to network with others in publishing. Through social media, I became friends with a novelist and television writer who connected me with her literary agent. A friend on Facebook put me in contact with his brother who just so happens to be the founder of a theatre group in New York City. And now the theatre is willing to read a sample from my play. Frankly, these are networking opportunities I likely would have never made had it not been for social media.

4. You can create communities.

There are all kinds of communities online — for cancer patients and survivors, playwrights, parents of children with autism, and pet owners, to name but a few. These communities enable people to band together to support each other, exchange resources, and share triumphs and struggles. Thanks to web-based programs like Ning, which is available for a fee, anyone can create an online community that will bring together people who might never have the chance to interact and learn from each other.

5. You can make things happen.

Social media allows you another forum to make your goals become a reality. Again, let me share from my personal life. I’m a cancer survivor. I was diagnosed with melanoma in 2003. Last year, I got involved in the LIVESTRONG Challenge in Philadelphia, an event designed to raise money for cancer. With just six weeks to raise money for a 10-mile bike ride, I turned to Facebook and Twitter to seek financial support from friends, colleagues, and family. My fundraising goal was $250 but thanks to the generous support of many people, I was able to raise over $1,500…and that in the midst of a crippling recession. I wasn’t the only one to use social media to raise funds. Many LIVESTRONG participants did so. The result? Over $3.2 million was raised to fight cancer.

As I conclude, let me challenge you to take some time to think about how social media might benefit your organization. Could you use social media to create a virtual community for your constituents? Think about your funding sources. Are they online? How can you interact with them virtually and, perhaps, build the foundation for future funding? What are you trying to achieve? How can social media help to make your aspirations become reality?

Consider the possibilities and start putting social media to work for you and your organization. The power is in your hands. Are you going to use it?

Partner Spotlight: Eric Seleznow

2010-06-14T10:48:00.004-04:00

Eric Seleznow, co-team leader of the NTAR Leadership Center’s State Leaders Innovation Institute’s Maryland team, has served as the Executive Director of Maryland’s Governor’s Workforce Investment Board since 2007. Throughout Eric’s extensive career in workforce development he has overseen the Montgomery County Maryland workforce development system, whose Workforce Investment Boards and One Stop Career Centers serve more than 10,000 people each year. An expert in corrections policy and workforce reentry initiatives, Eric brings a strong and diverse workforce perspective to his work with the State of Maryland and with the NTAR Leadership Center.

Listen to the podcast with Eric Seleznow, Executive Director of Maryland’s Governor’s Workforce Investment Board and co-team leader of the Maryland State Leaders Innovation Institute effort
Read a transcript of the podcast

One Size Fits All... with Style

2010-06-11T10:58:00.003-04:00

This is a guest post from Sheila Fesko, Senior Research Associate, Institute for Community Inclusion

For workforce development professionals who serve people with the most significant barriers to careers, the idea of ‘one size fits all’ service has gotten a bad name. The phrase suggests the most basic sense of workforce development services; a cookie-cutter approach brought to bear on people who require flexibility, creativity and a personal touch. It suggests saving time at the expense of delivering quality services.

When we think of how to make our One Stop Career Centers more efficient, we can’t help but wonder how it is that providing services more efficiency and to a larger number of people can be a bad thing?

The answer is simple, if unfortunate: we seem to have mistaken the need for high volume as an excuse for low quality.

Personally, I like high-volume solutions. I see no reason why the best strategies should not work for the widest possible range of customers. Particularly when economic conditions create an overwhelming demand for workforce development services, and when businesses, similarly, are called upon to operate with the greatest possible efficiency to meet the needs of the shareholders and customers, we have a responsibility to sponsor practices that truly meet the needs of the widest possible range of service-seekers. Perhaps we can call these services ‘One Size Fits All… with Style’.

High quality high volume service invariably means interagency collaboration that allows easy access to all partner services for career-seekers and businesses. It means customer-service mindset in the simplest elements of a One Stop; i.e. signs and marketing materials that reference services that customers will understand, rather than bureaucratic agency titles and regulatory authorities. Finally, it means taking the time – in staff training, service design, and customer welcoming – to ensure we can deliver services quickly, but successfully.

Consider the example of the WorkSource One Stop Career Center in the Tri-Cities area of Washington State. More than most, this One Stop took very seriously the idea of seamless, collaborative service delivery. Rather than breaking different agencies in to separate areas of the Center, staff from all partners occupy space adjacent to the customer resource area of the center. When it became clear that using rotating agency schedules to staff the front desk made for sub-standard intake and orientation delivered by staff who would rather have been focusing on their ‘real’ jobs, the partners pooled their resources and hired a dedicated front desk team, whose sole purpose was to guarantee the best possible welcome for every customer who came through the door.

Further, a business services team was formed, again by pooling resources from multiple partners. Staff in this team were assigned sectors – i.e. Health Care, Agriculture, Information Technology, etc. – so that they could learn these industries and their workforce and economic development needs as thoroughly as possible. More than just staff who took job orders from local businesses, these staff become advisers to businesses, central to their growth and direction. With coordination, care and creativity, this One Stop became an engine of economic development.

This example demonstrates the value in:
• collaboration that emphasizes people and services over agency lines,
• a customer service mentality basic to the design and delivery of services, and
• an environment where Workforce Development is an essential aspect of Economic Development.

By orienting ourselves to the strategies that best serve our customers – businesses and career-seekers – we position ourselves to provide the most efficient, effective and impactful services possible. Further, we deliver services that create permanent change for our customers.

What could possibly save more time than that?

Ask an Expert: Hawaii's Susan Miller

2010-05-18T14:58:00.017-04:00

QUICK QUESTIONS WITH: Susan Miller, Project Director for the Hawaii Medicaid Infrastructure Grant, HireAbilities Hawaii and a faculty member at the Center for Disability Studies at the University of Hawaii

Hire Abilities Hawaii, the state Medicaid Infrastructure Grant, was established in January 2005 to increase competitive employment outcomes for Hawaiians with disabilities, remove barriers to employment, and improve infrastructure in support of working people with disabilities. The NTAR Leadership Center spoke with Susan Miller, Director, about Hawaii’s efforts to promote employment opportunities for artists with disabilities in Hawaii’s large arts and tourism industry.

NTAR Leadership Center: Tell us about your exciting initiative that combines employment for artists with disabilities while promoting the state’s economic efforts to foster local arts and artists. How did you get started?

Susan Miller: In 2002, we responded to a request from the National Endowment for the Arts with Social Security and VSA Arts International to do a state survey on the status of access to careers in the arts for people with disabilities. At the time VSA Arts Hawaii was just reestablishing itself and the University of Hawaii's Center on Disability Studies was supporting that effort. We conducted the survey and found a lot of information that identified systems and institutional barriers for people with disabilities interested in art careers. We had a legislative summit and reported that to our state legislature. When the State of Hawaii applied for a Medicaid Infrastructure Grant (which we called "HireAbilities" ) we included information about our identified career barriers to the arts. The creative and cultural industry sector is a very big workforce sector in our state. It contributes $80 million to our state economy. Because of its size and importance, we felt it was relevant as a focus for employment for people with disabilities. We wanted to really try to get beyond the typically talked about disability employment opportunities.

NTAR Leadership Center: You mentioned Hawaii's large arts, culture, and tourism sector. Can you talk about the work you are doing that benefits people with disabilities, for example, the “100 x 100 Be a Part of Something Big” initiative?

Susan Miller: The “100 x 100” effort was an art show that we had at the 2010 Pacific Rim conference and was a demonstration of our work that we have been doing with the Department of Education. One of the things that our MIG Grant has done is given us the opportunity to work with the state Department of Education, the youth in transition effort and the Carl Perkin's Act Career and Educational Pathways . The art work displayed was a demonstration of the work of young artists that are in a project called Hawaii Arts at Work . Hawaii Arts at Work is a career and technical education program where novice and intermediate artists work to begin their transition to adult communities. They prepare for internships and apprenticeships and different kinds of employment in Hawaii’s creative industry sector.

So, while it may have looked like just your garden variety art show, it really was the culmination of six months of work in an instruction and production studio preparing people to begin to do transitions to apprenticeships and internships in the community through career and technical education pathways through the Department of Education. So, we're really proud of it because it involved the state Department of Education, our state Division of Vocational Rehabilitation, the school and the family sitting together to develop an IEP (Individualized Education Program). This was important to getting this kind of employment goal into the IEPs. In turn, this gives the students an opportunity to have internships and to be in the work world rather than waiting until they graduate or complete high school and then start sort of scrambling around for work. They have the opportunity to have an internship or an apprenticeship while they're still in high school and can earn credit and, hopefully, it turns into a more permanent job.

NTAR Leadership Center: In general, what kinds of employers are you working with?

Susan Miller: On the island of Oahu there is somewhere around 100 organizations, non-profits and different organizations that are connected to what our Division of Business, Economic Development, and Tourism categorized as creative industries. We are talking about the potential of upwards to 100 different arts and cultural industries that are potential placement sites for interns or apprentices in addition to individual master artists that are part of our Hawaii Tourism Authority grants. We are really interested in demonstrating this particular sector because it's really something that's untapped.

We also have a hotel industry, a restaurant industry, and we have a lot of other jobs in other industries that traditionally people with disabilities are sort of aimed towards because it is entry level work and do not require really high skills. We think that there is an enormous opportunity to target creative industries because it's so untapped. There is somewhere upwards to 60 statewide museums that are funded in part by the Federal Government and by the state that have a mission to include people with disabilities in their employment, in their hiring practices. We think that's another untapped area where we can do some job development and placement for internships.

Work and Wellness

2010-05-18T14:36:00.005-04:00

This is a guest post from Jeffrey Stoller, Director of Communications and Outreach, John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development

Many people with disabilities have a special appreciation for how important a job is to a person’s well-being. This feeling comes from long years of experiencing disproportionately high unemployment despite having significant skills to share. It is not just the financial impact of being jobless that matters; there is a high emotional price that is paid as well.

May is a good time to remind the public and policymakers about the special importance of work to people eager to reach beyond their physical and emotional limitations. Every year since 1949, the National Mental Health Alliance (now known as Mental Health America) has designated the month of May as “Mental Health Month”. In May 2010, with millions of Americans out of work for the first time in their careers, this may be a “teachable moment” for many who have never recognized the connection between work and wellness.

The emotional toll of joblessness has been dramatically illustrated by two recent nationwide surveys conducted by the Heldrich Center for Workforce Development at Rutgers University. The Center, which also hosts the NTAR Leadership Center, has tracked the views of American workers for more than a decade through its acclaimed Work Trends survey series. Its research generated headlines worldwide when it conducted a special poll of unemployed American workers just before Labor Day 2009 and again this spring.

The 1,200 jobless workers interviewed for last summer’s Anguish of Unemployment survey used language to describe their situation that would be familiar to anyone with disabilities who has sought – and been denied – an opportunity to work. The respondents described themselves as “discouraged”, “shaken”, “fearful”, “traumatized” and “scared of what will happen.” They reported “feeling worthless” and regretted that that they were “not contributing to family finances”.

The Great Recession of 2007-2009 took a heavy toll on these individuals. Three-quarters of the jobless reported stress in their daily lives, two-thirds reported being depressed, three-fifths felt helpless, and more than half said they were angry. More than half suffered the embarrassment of borrowing money from family or friends, and believed recent changes to the U.S. economy were fundamental and lasting.

Six months later, 900 of the same people expressed similar feelings in a new Heldrich Center survey entitled No End in Sight: The Agony of Prolonged Unemployment. Nearly 80% of the jobseekers were still unemployed, and many reported a deep sense of frustration and low esteem due to what they saw as outright discrimination in hiring. In the words of the report’s co-authors, “The inability of these jobseekers to new find opportunities is an economic and cultural disaster.”

So what’s the “good news” here? It seems to me that millions of Americans are experiencing for the first time what it feels to be a skilled person who cannot connect with meaningful work. Few know and understand this feeling better than the many talented people with disabilities who have frequently encountered prospective employers who fail to recognize an applicant’s countless abilities. There is a window of opportunity here: to explain the goals of disability employment to a diverse group that suddenly see the same barriers to work.

Today’s unemployed could be important allies in the fight to expand disability employment in the years ahead. The people made jobless in the current economic downturn include many innovative, highly-trained, highly-educated workers who understand the pain of having their skills overlooked or being offered a substandard wage.

This May, the best way for people with disabilities to celebrate Mental Health Month may be to reach out to other jobseekers. They may find they have a lot in common.

Strategy Spotlight: Accessible Technology

2010-05-17T10:37:00.005-04:00

Technology is considered accessible when it can be used just as effectively by people with disabilities, including veterans and those aging into their disability, as by people without disabilities. Advances in computer technology and internet access can bring information, services, and connections not previously available, but it is important to ensure that websites, social media, software, and other technology are available for the benefit of all and that everyone can see, hear, and use them.

Deb Ruh, Founder and CEO of TecAccess, is a major supporter of the rights of people with disabilities and a leading expert in accessible technology. Ms. Ruh serves on several steering committees, is a highly sought after internal and domestic keynote speaker, has authored a number of articles for national publications, has been featured in national media campaigns, and has won numerous awards. Deb is also an active participant in Virginia’s efforts to significantly improve the employment of Virginias with disabilities. Her company, TecAccess, has also been honored with several awards, including the prestigious U.S. Department of Labor’s Presidential New Freedom Initiative Award.

- Listen to the podcast with Deb Ruh, Founder and CEO, TecAccess
- Read a transcript of the podcast
- Visit the TecAccess website for more information and accessible technology resources

About Disability Employment

2010-05-14T08:59:00.004-04:00

This is a guest post from Robert B. Nicholas, Ph.D., Senior Visiting Fellow for Disability Research, John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development.

I coordinate the research agenda and provide technical assistance for the NTAR Leadership Center. My background is an almost forty year career in the planning and administration of services and supports for people with disabilities. I have been part of the transition of people with disabilities from institutions to communities. I have participated in the growth of supported employment from its infancy and provided technical assistance to an ODEP Customized Employment Grant. I continue to be inspired by the capability of people with disabilities to work and the often dramatic improvement in quality of life which results from employment.

It is from the perspective of a disability system professional that I was moved by the call to arms from my colleague and friend Lisa Stern in her January blog. In reference to disability employment services, she says “It’s not working” and concludes that we need to be exploring new approaches. I agree whole heartedly. This isn’t to say that we haven’t made fundamental progress in the employment of people with disabilities. In fact, across the nation there are rich examples of people with diverse disabilities working at skilled, complex jobs. They have shown conclusively that people with disabilities want to work when given opportunities and appropriate supports and can be a valuable resource to employers in meeting their workforce needs. Our challenge is to replicate these possibilities for the unacceptably high percentage of people with disabilities not currently included in the nation’s workforce.

The NTAR Leadership Center is pursuing important new directions in the employment of people with disabilities in response to this challenge. The Center is fostering the inclusion of people with disabilities in workforce planning and generic workforce services systems. The Center is aware that a growing number of the nation’s leading employers have recognized the “business case” for employing people with disabilities and have established disability recruitment initiatives. Accordingly, the Center is highlighting effective strategies for collaboration between the disability and generic services systems to support employers to meet their workforce needs through the recruitment and retention of employees with disabilities. The NTAR Leadership Center’s approach is consistent with the fundamental value driving change in disability systems; full inclusion of people with disabilities in our nation’s communities.

It is important to note that the NTAR Leadership Center’s efforts do not compete with other important disability employment efforts such as Customized Employment, Medicaid Infrastructure Grants, and Employment First initiatives. Indeed, effective, well coordinated disability system supports are essential to the success of employer recruitment efforts. I believe strongly, however, that progress in increasing the workforce participation rates of people with disabilities will be employer driven and based on the “business case.”

Strategy Spotlight: Using New Media to Collaborate and Build Partnerships

2010-05-07T15:12:00.006-04:00

Social media tools are becoming ever present and proving to be an effective way to build collaborations and partnerships and disseminate research and knowledge. From Facebook and LinkedIn to Twitter, blogs, Google Buzz, and video and photo sharing platforms, limitless opportunities are available to start a conversation and engage with your audience and peers.

In a recent podcast, DiscoverAbility NJ project coordinator Michele Martin discussed lessons she’s learned from social media work and best practices for governments and nonprofits.

Listen to the podcast with Michele Martin, DiscoverAbility NJ Project Coordinator

Read the transcript

Visit Michele's blog, “The Bamboo Project," for many more social media resources

Follow the NTAR Leadership Center on Twitter, like us on Facebook, and join our LinkedIn group!

Partner Spotlight: Karen McCulloh

2010-04-30T10:35:00.006-04:00

Karen McCulloh is a recognized leader in the field of disability employment. As a registered nurse who found difficulty in regaining employment after her disability, she established her own consulting firm and a new field of nursing – Community Health Disability Education.

Ms. McCulloh’s drive and passion led to her position as the Executive Director of disabilityworks, an Illinois statewide initiative targeted to increasing the employment of people with disabilities and to “inspire sound employer-to-employee relationships.”

In her tremendous career, Karen has served as a Department of Labor federal appointee, as the Chair of the Disability Subcommittee of the National Job Corps Advisory Committee and on President Obama’s transition team. The NTAR Leadership Center is proud to have Karen on our Technical Assistance Advisory Panel.

- Listen to the podcast with Karen McCulloh
- Read a transcript of the podcast

State Spotlight: District of Columbia

2010-04-29T08:42:00.006-04:00

The District of Columbia has been working to create a strong and sustaining “Employment Alliance” to promote better employment outcomes for DC residents with disabilities. Under the leadership of Judith Heumann, the Director of the Department on Disability Services (DDS), the District has been busy bringing together leaders in workforce development, economic development, the business community, and disability organizations to establish better linkages for residents with disabilities to jobs available in the federal government, with federal contractors, and in high-growth industries in the area such as health care, hospitality, and professional services.

To this end, District officials are actively engaged in a number of initiatives, including

Creating a “community of excellence in customized employment” designed to build the capacity of DC government and private provider staff to effectively use customized employment practices,
Sponsoring a Project Search model for transitioning youth in partnership with the U.S. Department of Labor and, soon, other federal agencies,
Enhancing collaborations with local employers through a partnership with the District of Columbia's Business Leadership Network,
Strengthening its labor market "intelligence" through development of a process to better educate vocational rehabilitation counselors and others on how to access and use Labor Market Information, and
Putting in place new strategies to increase the number of training and ”to work” options available to residents such as internships, through sector-based job training and/or small business development.

Listen to the audio podcast interview with Judith Heumann, Director of the District of Columbia’s Department on Disability Services

Read the transcript of the interview

View a PowerPoint presentation about Project Search, the District's school-to-career project for youth with disabilities, and a collaborative program with the U.S. Department of Labor. This program is the first of its kind in the federal government.

Life at Rutgers

2010-04-23T10:36:00.003-04:00

This is a guest post from Junior Rutgers University Student and NTAR Leadership Center Intern Radhiya Abdul-Raheem

In this academic school year, I’ve turned over a new leaf. I’ll admit that being the youngest in my family I’ve gotten used to having my hand extended, waiting for my wants and needs to be handed to me. I could not help it. Thankfully, I wasn’t spoiled to the extent where I wouldn’t reach the point in my life where I am today.

This school year has brought a relentless characteristic out of me, the quality of leadership. From experience, I’ve learned that possessing the quality of leadership leaves me no room to be spoon-fed. I have taken on new responsibilities since the start of the fall semester. After seeing a friend of mine struggle to keep a student-run publication afloat as editor-and-chief, I decided to extend my position as photographer of the newspaper to co-editor and treasurer. I did this mostly because I hated to witness a paper with such a rich history fall below the radar. I also was faced with a dilemma on campus involving the transportation bus system. Without getting into great detail, I was put in the position where the revised bus route was hindering my wheelchair access to the bus stop across the street from my on campus apartment. I, once again, took the courage to actually project my concerns, something I usually would leave for others to do for me. After making my rights and concerns known to administrators and after getting my peers involved, I got want I wanted, which was equal access to the campus bus that is meant for the use of all Rutgers students. After reaping the fruits of my labor, I felt proud and I felt visible. For those who have been overlooked know very well how that was victorious for me. These accomplishments come at the eve of another stepping stone.

I was interested in interning at NTAR because it is dedicated to increasing the self-reliance of persons with disabilities. I was intrigued at the fact that I can take part in the self-reliance of others such as myself who may find it hard to be truly independent in an imperfect society that is not fully prepared for them. Having this position has allowed me to further exercise the leader inside of me that I have suppressed for so long (and it continues to be a work in progress). My leadership has taught me not to be afraid to make sure my voice is heard. Fittingly, this is the focus of NTAR’s mission.

Before my time at NTAR is concluded I hope to gain a ruthless drive for bettering the lives of people with disabilities.

Collaboration

2010-04-16T10:27:00.003-04:00

This is a guest post from Elaine Katz, Vice President of Grant Programs and Special Initiatives, Kessler Foundation

Ah springtime! Its arrival heralds everything new. But the promise of renewal is quickly tempered by the realities of our “new normal”, diminished federal and state budgets for July implementation and a scarcity of private funding.

Collaborations, agreements between two or more organizations to work together, are a solution for leveraging dollars within tight budgets. The real benefit is extending public or private dollars to capitalize on economies of scale and avoiding duplication of services. Typically used in projects that are ambitious, such as those serving a large geographic area and target population, collaborations can also be effective for smaller organizations, with proper planning.

Although simple in concept, forming a successful collaboration is difficult. Making sure it works is even harder. Picking a project and writing a detailed strategic game plan can be accomplished rather competently and quickly by most organizations. Choosing partners isn’t too difficult either. Most organizations can readily select partners from a known pool of agencies. Often it’s figuring out how to work effectively together that’s the tricky part.

As a first step, it’s best to opt for a formal “MOU”, a written memo of understanding among the partners, such as the formal agreement the National Organization on Disabilities (NOD) has with the US Army for their Army Wounded Warriors (AW2) Careers Demonstration Project. Partner cash commitments, in-kind contributions, organizational responsibilities, and/or identifying sources of additional funding, are just some of the details that must be clearly delineated. All project collaborators need to determine in advance their role in project outcomes and set rules on how to deal with non-performance. In this example, NOD began with the concept of linking soldiers with significant disabilities to employment and other related services upon returning to their local communities, following medical discharge. Recognizing the value of this one-to-one approach, the US Army signed a memo of understanding with NOD, enabling NOD’s Career Specialists to partner with the army’s AW2 advocates. Using seed funding from Kessler Foundation, NOD began reaching out to national and local funding partners in Texas, Colorado and North Carolina, sites for the initial pilot projects. A partnership was also initiated with the Economic Mobility Corporation to provide data and evaluation services.

Establishing new project collaborations based on verbal commitments can also be successful, especially if partners have previously worked together. Cornell University’s Disability and Employment Institute recently joined with the New Jersey Society of Human Resource Managers (NJSHRM) to create a new collaborative model for employers and social service providers aimed at increasing employment outcomes for individuals with disabilities, with funding from Kessler Foundation. Each organization held defined roles – NJSHRM organized the workshops for its members throughout New Jersey, while Cornell staff facilitated the program and designed online tutorials. Additional community partners helped coordinate meetings for job development professionals at local social service agencies. In this case, Cornell and NJSHRM successfully educated human resource managers and non-profit professionals. On the other hand, verbal agreements are the easiest to fall apart, especially when one partner does not complete or fulfill agreed upon tasks.

As reduced public and private funding continue to affect the organizational budgets, forming collaborations can be a valuable tool. With a little creativity and careful planning, collaboration can help your organization create new programs or sustain current projects.

Employment First

2010-03-30T09:09:00.002-04:00

This is a guest post from Wendy Parent, Research Associate Professor and Assistant Director, Lawrence Site, Kansas University Center on Developmental Disabilities, NTAR National Research Advisory Panel Member

Employment First is an exciting new public policy that is gaining increased momentum at the state and federal levels. It establishes the idea that integrated competitive employment is the first option for all individuals regardless of disability level or support needs. This is significant in that it changes the way we think and overtime changes the way we do things with funding streams and service delivery practices eventually following suit.

To date, numerous states have implemented some type of Employment First activity. These include: Minnesota, Oklahoma, Georgia, Washington, Tennessee, California, Massachusetts, Wisconsin, Missouri, Indiana, Colorado, Vermont, Delaware, Iowa, and Kansas. Efforts have focused upon conferences, summits, publications, training and technical assistance, agency goals and mission statements, and policies and legislation. Kansas has recently submitted an Employment First Bill, H.R. 2669, which has passed the House and is currently in the Senate for vote. This landmark piece of legislation establishes that “…competitive and integrated employment of persons with disabilities in communities of Kansas shall be the first priority in the state…” and creates an oversight commission for monitoring and accountability.

The Employment First Bill introduced in Kansas represents the culmination of a series of major activities and multiple peoples’ involvement. The original impetus was the result of contract negations between the state funding agencies and provider organizations including self-advocates in which “employment first” language was added. A task force of key stakeholders was appointed and the outcome of their work was an Initial Report and Recommendations. The concept was rolled out for the legislature at a reception conducted at the beginning of their session with presentations from several individuals with disabilities who talked about their employment experiences, an employer, and a researcher who discussed employment outcomes in Kansas. Information sharing and networking for professionals, families, and individuals with disabilities is proposed at a two-day Kansas Employment First Summit to be held in the near future with an impressive line-up of national speakers and ending with a Conversation with the Governor’s Cabinet Secretaries and Directors.

Why emphasize work? Research shows that employers express positive attitudes toward workers with disabilities and are willing to hire employees with extensive support needs when they receive competent services from disability employment programs (Katz & Luecking, 2009). Individuals with disabilities themselves, tell us they want to work and have made employment their priority (Alliance for Full Participation, 2009; The Riot, 2007). Furthermore, supported and customized employment strategies are effective at meeting the hiring needs of the employer and the support needs of the employee resulting in a cost-efficient alternative to sheltered work and day services (Cimera, 2008; Office of Disability Employment Policy, 2005; Wehman, Inge, Revell, & Brooke, 2007).

Why Employment First? Nationally, the number of individuals participating in sheltered work and day services continues to rise. In Kansas and many other states, the majority of their dollars are spent on funding these segregated programs for the very population of people for whom supported and customized employment strategies were developed and have proven to be effective. Multiple systemic issues contribute to the problem. A federal and/or statewide employment first policy would begin to shift these outcomes by establishing integrated competitive employment as the first option for people with disabilities. No one agency or organization can do it alone. Employment First would put everyone on the same agenda, working towards the same goal, with integrated competitive employment as the expected outcome and the focus of limited resources. A collaborative effort will direct our attention to the challenges we must address in order to make these outcomes a reality for all citizens with disabilities. Employment First could potentially be the change we need.

Don’t Be Afraid of Social Media!

2010-03-22T08:56:00.008-04:00

This is a guest post from Savannah Barnett, Research Coordinator, NTAR Leadership Center

Sure, we all know the myths about social media: it’s for teenagers, it’s for telling people about what you had for lunch, it’s vacuous and a waste of time. These myths are being reinforced by employers who block access to these sites and don’t let their employees participate. While it is true that many people (including young people) have private Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn accounts , these resources can be deployed strategically to better market the services that governments and nonprofits provide, inform the public about news, legislative and regulatory change, and new research and resources.

In my role at the NTAR Leadership Center I help coordinate this blog, our twitter account, and our Facebook page. In this capacity I sometimes encounter people who seem dismayed, overwhelmed, and alarmed at the possibility of engaging, sharing resources, and expressing their policy views in these online forums for a variety of reasons.

Social media is a great way to share resources and increase collaboration and coordination with colleagues, clients, and others who are interested in your work. Unfortunately not all companies (and especially not all government agencies) are embracing these positive resources that can extend the reach of an organization and contribute greatly to staff professional development.

One myth about social media is that employees cannot be trusted to fairly represent an organization online. I want state policymakers, leaders of nonprofits, and jobseekers to know that there is nothing to be afraid of! If you speak to colleges around the office water cooler or make new contacts at a conference, you can absolutely meaningfully engage in online social networking in ways that promote collaboration, coordination, and your own professional development.

If your role is nonpartisan, simply stay away from expressing partisan activity online as you do in person. If there are confidential aspects of work, keep them confidential online, just like you do in person. If you are in a position to issue a social media policy for your organization, encourage the use of good judgment, authenticity, and value to your online presence. (For more information on social media policies see http://mashable.com/2009/06/02/social-media-policy-musts/)

Another common myth is that social media will be a waste of time and will monopolize staff time. If part of your role as an organization is to communicate anything to anyone you should consider the monetary and time savings that can be had through online mechanisms. Twitter lets you instantly track feedback about your organization or agency, blogs let you get the word out about current issues, and Facebook and LinkedIn are great ways to build networks. Posting resources on these sites is much quicker than engaging in separate outreach activities for multiple constituencies and incredibly faster than relying on print. Additionally, many of these resources can be accessed on cell phones and other portable devices quickly.

If you’re still not entirely convinced about actively engaging in social media activity, consider participating passively at first. By watching a twitter feed or belonging to a LinkedIn group you get resources right at your fingertips, with very little effort. Just sign up for an account, start following a few people, and let the information flow in.

For those of you who are curious about new forms of interaction go ahead, step a bit outside of your comfort zone and sign up for these free services. While you’re there don’t forget to follow the NTAR Leadership Center on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.

Scary Realities and Practical Solutions

2010-03-15T07:51:00.000-04:00

According to a recent report issued by the Heldrich Center for Workforce Development, the labor market, workforce and educational system are undergoing significant changes in the first decade of the 21st century. With widespread unemployment at all levels of education, longer than usual time spent now looking for a job, and declining heath care coverage, it is no surprise that the Heldrich report highlights how very dissatisfied people are with both their personal economic circumstances as well as the country’s.

At the same time, state budgets and state workforces are suffering as well -- teetering on the point of going broke or broken. To respond to taxpayers cries for less government, lower taxes and to keep states from going bankrupt, federal and state law makers are desperately looking for fresh solutions to cutting costs and getting Americans back to work. The jobs crisis and state budget crises demands immediate attention, but need solutions that are practical and evidence based, and that mutually help job seekers and employers.

Jobseekers (including those with disabilities) need solutions that provide them with a paycheck first and foremost, along with a work experience and the ability to acquire skills and education if that paycheck is not from a full time job. Employers need solutions that can get them access to qualified workers at wages and benefits they can afford. As seen in the recent increases in part time and temporary workers, employers continue to remain reluctant to make permanent hires because of doubts about the recovery’s durability, and still remain skittish about the escalating costs of health care and the uncertainty of health care reform.

As for public policy makers charged with creating and implementing solutions, they need strategies that are low cost and high volume; that are easy to implement with a minimum degree of complexity and that promise to yield a moderate degree of success (meaning jobs) for hundreds, if not thousands of people. What state policy makers cannot afford these days are boutique programs, untested initiatives or further policies that research demonstrates don’t yield big results for either the unemployed or employers. They also can’t afford programs that are high cost and low volume; that require lots of complex moving parts to implement, that require low paid front line workers to develop new, higher skills in order to make it work, and where employment is realized for only tens of people, not in the hundreds and thousands needed to make a dent in the unemployment rate.

The $15 billion jobs bill passed by the Senate and the House is sadly likely to be much ado about nothing. The bill, which includes tax breaks to businesses to hire, will have a negligible effect on employment rates – especially among people with disabilities. In fact, evidence from the Work Opportunity and Welfare-to-Work Tax Credits points out that these employer tax breaks for new hires have suffered from poor participation and have not had any meaningful effect on employment rates among the disadvantaged (Urban-Brookings Tax Policy Center, 2005), despite what is seen as large potential benefits to firms. And for people with disabilities who have been routinely shut out of a robust labor market, much less one in recession, hiring credits are unlikely to yield any benefits at all.

Economists and academics have suggested other solutions that would put ‘jobs’ back in a credible job creation strategy. These include expanding summer youth employment programs, and deploying time-limited employment programs for public purposes in public and nonprofit agencies. These also include transitional job programs such as on-the-job training or OJT in private firms and nonprofits, and paid work experience programs such as through internships and apprenticeships. Other promising strategies, some more complex and longer to implement, include stimulating small business development including seeding and supporting ‘real businesses’ through nonprofits.

Any successful national jobs strategy must provide mutual support to jobseekers need for work and income, and businesses need to stay in business. Only if these two needs are met can communities prosper and our nation thrive. The current job bill falls far short.

Kathy Krepcio
Director, NTAR Leadership Center

Introducing the Disability Supplier Diversity Program (DSDP)

2010-03-05T13:52:00.007-05:00

Across the country, minority-owned and female-owned businesses have had a competitive advantage because they provide other businesses with the ability to achieve diversity goals. Until now, that same advantage was not available to businesses that were owned and operated by people with disabilities. Two key organizations have partnered to make sure that those competitive advantages are made also available to disabled-owned businesses through the Disability Supplier Diversity Program (DSDP).

The New Jersey Business Leadership Network (NJBLN), a program of the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce Foundation, has entered into a partnership with the US Business Leadership Network (USBLN) to promote and develop the Disability Supplier Diversity Program (DSDP). The DSDP is a process that produces a credential certifying a business as disabled-owned, thus enhancing that company’s ability to compete for contracts from companies seeking to increase their supplier diversity.

The DSDP was created and launched by the USBLN in response to feedback from the business community that indicated a third-party certification credential would be a mechanism they could use to increase their supplier diversity.

Required supporting documentation includes business contact, capabilities, historical, financial and governance information. There is an annual recertification process as certification is valid for one year. Site visits take place at a minimum of every third year.

The USBLN is in the last phase of piloting and verifying the credentialing process and has partnered with the NJBLN to participate in the pilot, and promote the program in the state of New Jersey. Three New Jersey businesses are currently being vetted through the DSDP process.

If you are a disability owned business or know of an owner of such a business and would like more information on DSDP, please contact Patty Cullinane at the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce Foundation (908-975-3211) or via e-mail (patty.cullinane@njchamber.com).

Patty Cullinane
Director, Business Development
NJ Chamber of Commerce Foundation/NJBLN

The NJBLN and USBLN are employer-led organizations committed to enhancing employment opportunities for individuals with disabilities. The NJBLN is a state affiliate of the national USBLN.

USDOL/ODEP Releases 4 Step Guide

2010-03-05T09:24:00.004-05:00

The U.S. Department of Labor's Office of Disability Employment Policy releases a four step guide to recruiting, hiring, and retaining employees with disabilities.

Topics include:

Incentives & ROI
Recruiting
Interviewing & Hiring
Achieving Workplace Success
Retaining Valued Employees
Links & Resources

View the PDF version of Diversifying Your Workforce or order hard copies.

Veterans Green Jobs

2010-02-17T09:43:00.006-05:00

Veterans Green Jobs is addressing our nation’s energy and environmental security challenges through utilizing one of our Nation’s greatest natural leadership resources: the veteran population. By doing this, VGJ hopes to replicate the camaraderie, intensity, and meaning of work that our service members experienced in uniform service in their civilian lives.

We started our work with our first cohort in April of 2009. Looking at a picture of this first group, you could not point to the individuals struggling with post traumatic stress issues, the individual with symptoms of traumatic brain injury, those veterans who were once homeless, or the young combat veteran and single father who has only 52% of his lung capacity due to injuries received at war. In other words, you could not look at the picture and pick out the veteran who was or was not disabled. Disabled is defined by the 1990 American with Disabilities Act as a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more of the major life activities of such individual.

From the beginning, VGJ has been serving disabled veterans and believes that regardless of a disability being visibly noticed or not, our veterans coming back from service or war who are disabled need to have the same opportunities and possibilities afforded them that any veteran returning to a life outside of uniform is afforded. Unfortunately, our country has failed since the Vietnam era to welcome properly home any veteran and those with disabilities face additional challenges. As a group, veterans face a troubling picture painted through higher levels of homelessness, incarceration, drug use, violence, unemployment, and suicide than the non-veteran population.

Working through the vehicle of green jobs and cohort based training we believe veterans, regardless of disability, can take a leadership role in securing America’s energy security and repaint the veteran experience in a decidedly more positive light. VGJ is working with many different partners, including NTAR, to ensure that we do not leave any veteran behind and that all of our programs are as universal in design and delivery for maximum inclusion.

We are also working on a joint project with the Colorado Department of Human Services (CDHS), the Colorado Historic Society, and the Homelake Foundation to create the Nation’s first disabled veterans green jobs training center. This project aims to convert a portion of the Homelake Veterans Center outside Monte Vista, Colorado to become this needed facility. Our hope over the next three to four years is to implement a phased facility renovation program creating residential, instruction, and community facilities on the site. These will integrate universal and renewable energy and green building principles already underway at the site. Part of the intended use of these facilities is to create active and regular opportunities for engagement with the larger local community. Disabled veterans will be key participants and workers in the further creation and construction of this vision.

I encourage anyone reading this blog post who has additional interest in our programs, or any ideas, resources, comments, contacts, or questions about our work in general and the Homelake project specifically, to visit our website www.veterangreenjobs.org to learn more. Please also comment here, or contact me directly about how we can together achieve our vision of not leaving any veteran behind

Stacy Bare
Director of Operations and National Programs
Veterans Green Jobs
stacy@veteransgreenjobs.org

Strategies for Growing Jobs Must Include an Economic Recovery for People with Disabilities

2010-02-11T14:52:00.001-05:00

In the past several weeks, Governors from California to New York have announced job creation initiatives and strategies that have included helping small businesses stay open and hire new staff; that look to recruit and retain industries vital to they state’s economy; that effect greater diversity in their state economies beyond traditional crucial industries; and that put a new imperative on workforce/education training to develop skilled workers to match industry needs.

While I remain optimistic that our nation’s Governors as well as President Obama have a renewed focus on jobs, it is highly likely that jobseekers with disabilities will remain marginalized when it comes to who benefits from publicly funded job investments. That is, unless there is persistent attention directed at insuring their inclusion in federal and state “Main Street" economic efforts.

For Americans with disabilities, the unemployment numbers over the years speak for themselves - they have never been part of any real economic recovery. What I see is decades of unemployment, underemployment, poverty and significant exclusion from the competitive labor market – in part enabled by out-of-date, exclusionary public policies and labor market practices.

For Americans with disabilities, gaining any significant job opportunities from the President’s first stimulus package or new gubernatorial strategies remains to be seen. A scan of grantees receiving green jobs training funds shows that less than a handful identified people with disabilities as a target population for training. A scan of state plans outlining new job creation strategies mention special initiatives to create job pathways for welfare recipients, youth, food stamp recipients and laid off workers, but with the exception of disabled veterans, no mention of insuring that all Americans have equal access to these opportunities.

In order to insure that Americans with disabilities, who want to work, can benefit from these new state and federal job creation investments, we should not be afraid to let our White House and our State Houses know that a jobs program for all should mean all. And that means improving who gets access to new publicly financed skills training, education, and jobs. Much more can be accomplished in new job creation strategies than just putting some people back to work. Federal and state officials have a tremendous opportunity to create, along with jobs, new policies and practices that removes barriers to work, and creates better access to jobs so that people with disabilities can truly participate in an economic recovery.

Kathy Krepcio
Director, NTAR Leadership Center

State Updates

2010-02-10T10:19:00.002-05:00

Last October, Seeding Change featured Maryland's effort to develop multi-agency strategies to ensure that the talents of Marylanders with disabilities are included in state plans to prepare for job growth resulting from the expansion of military bases under their Base Realignment and Closure (BRAC) initiative. Since that time, Maryland has held several career expos and workshops for people with disabilities looking for BRAC-related employment, contracted with an AmeriCorps volunteer to conduct outreach to college students with disabilities, and developed and issued fact sheets on security clearances, universal design, asset development, and base realignment and closure.

- Read the Maryland Fact Sheet: Security Clearances: What is a Security Clearance and Why Should I Obtain One?
- Read the Maryland Fact Sheet: Universal Design for Housing
- Read the Maryland Fact Sheet: Asset Development: Why Asset Development?
- Read the Maryland Fact Sheet: Base Realignment
- View information about the 2010 Essential Workplace Skills Webinar Series

Also highlighted in the fall were the Commonwealth of Virginia's efforts to facilitate stronger collaboration among members of its business, economic development, workforce development, and disability and rehabilitation communities. In November, Virginia released the final report from its Governor's Forum on Disability and Economic Development, which was distributed to all Forum participants, state agencies, and the Virginia General Assembly.

- View the Virginia Governor's Forum on Disability and Economic Development final report titled "Virginia's Call to Action."

Looking Back

2010-02-08T09:56:00.002-05:00

Did you know that since 2007, the NTAR Leadership Center has:

Conducted more than 14 training webinars on such topics as blending and braiding resources, sector strategies, understanding and using labor market information, understanding customized employment practices, and asset development, as well as myriad topics related to leadership, partnership building, and collaboration. View these archived webinars.

Grown the number of states in its State Peer Leaders Network (SPLN) to 24. The SPLN now includes Alaska, California, Connecticut, the District of Columbia, Florida, Illinois, Iowa, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Texas, Vermont, and Virginia. For more information about how to join the SPLN, or to request technical assistance from the NTAR Leadership Center consortium members, visit our state Peer Leaders Network page.

Conducted six surveys asking states in our SPLN about their efforts on outcome measurement, sector strategies, economic stimulus funding, Workforce Investment Act (WIA) reauthorization, self-employment, and states as model employers of people with disabilities. View summary reports of these surveys.

Leadership Spotlight: Megan Juring

2010-02-02T08:34:00.003-05:00

Megan Juring has been a tremendous public policy leader in the field of disability employment policy. She currently serves as the Assistant Secretary of Olmstead Activities at the California Health and Human Services Agency and has extensive experience both in the workforce field as well as in the disability field. Megan is also the co-chair of the NTAR Leadership Center's Technical Assistance Panel, where her real-world experience and expertise are invaluable to helping shape and direct the technical assistance that the NTAR Leadership Center provides. In her role with the State of California, she has not only been active in workforce issues but also with issues surrounding the challenges of an aging population and helped develop a plan to address the unique needs of citizens with Alzheimer's disease within the state. Megan's leadership has also helped ensure success for AB 1269, a bill that expanded Medi-Cal eligibility limits to allow more people with disabilities to earn and save without fear of lost coverage.

Listen to the audio podcast interview with Megan Juring about the importance of peer learning and the challenges of driving change in a tough state economic climate.

Read the transcript of the interview.

View a video of Megan speaking about her role as co-chair of the NTAR Leadership Center's Technical Assistance Panel.

Every Willing Heart

2010-02-01T10:00:00.000-05:00

In his inaugural address just over a year ago, President Obama said something that resonated deeply: “The success of our economy has always depended not just on the size of our gross domestic product, but on the reach of our prosperity, on our ability to extend opportunity to every willing heart – not out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.”

As the nation starts to crawl out of its deep economic hole, it might seem counter intuitive to talk about disability employment. But a large body of evidence and a growing public policy consensus suggest that the president is right: it’s in the nation’s best interest for everyone to work.

That notion is articulated in the value proposition adopted by Minnesota’s SLII team: We need everyone in the workforce for businesses to thrive and communities to prosper. This is the organizing principle of the Minnesota team’s work.

Our work assumes that employers will recognize that it is in their own best interest to seek out "every willing heart" from populations that have long been under-represented in the workplace. This belief represents a vision of workplace flexibility (or customization) that provides accommodations, maximizes productivity, changes workplace experiences and attitudes, and reconfigures the composition of the workforce, perhaps dramatically, and perhaps forever.

New hiring policies might, for example, distinguish between “qualified” workers (who meet specific and rigid job requirements) and “quality” workers (who maybe wouldn't meet rigid qualification tests, but who would demonstrate flexibility, trainability and eagerness to work). Policies like that very likely would bring new workers into the workplace rather than erecting barriers that keep them out. That would indeed be a historic change.

A couple of years ago Minnesota employment planners identified a number of workforce issues that state government will be forced to address soon. Minnesota, like the rest of the nation, has an aging workforce, accelerating retirements, and a looming shortage of people who have the education, skills and training to fill key government positions. The planners also identified several underutilized populations in the workforce and outlined strategies to include those populations—including people with disabilities—in the state's workforce planning.

One of several responses to these findings was an executive branch initiative to make Minnesota a model employer of people with disabilities. The idea was to create an expectation—not a hope or a wish or a request, but an expectation—that all state hiring managers would be both intentional and proactive in recruiting and hiring people with disabilities. The results, while admittedly modest in numerical terms, have nonetheless raised dramatically the profile of disability employment in state government. In the first couple of years, the model employer initiative generated about 100 new government internships, apprenticeships and part-time or full-time jobs for people with disabilities. In a state workforce that comprises some 40,000 employees, that's a small but very real shift. The early results of this initiative show great promise, and it appears likely that the trend will continue as more and more employees retire from public service.

The reality of workforce shortages for everyone is becoming increasingly dire. Employers will have to compete, as never before, for skilled workers. Attitudes toward hiring people with disabilities are changing, and public policy is shifting in the direction ensuring employment for every willing heart. Not, as President Obama said, out of charity, but because it is the surest route to our common good.

John Fisher
Public Affairs Director, Vocational Rehabilitation Services
Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development

Testimony from Jade Gingerich

2010-01-29T11:10:00.007-05:00

The following is testimony by Jade Gingerich, Director of Employment Policy, Maryland Department of Disabilities, delivered to the Department of Labor's Office of Disability Employment Policy.

As Director of Employment Policy for the Maryland Department of Disabilities and Project Director for Maryland's Medicaid Infrastructure Grant, I respectfully submit the following for consideration.

Medicaid Infrastructure Grants must be reauthorized to continue the important cross agency employment efforts underway. The MIG emphasizes long term, statewide strategic planning for /sustainable/ infrastructure. Through a multistate effort, a national marketing campaign targeting employers, titled "Think Beyond the Label" is launching this month, one example of the broad impact of the MIG dollars.

Efforts such as the NTAR project, funded by ODEP, should be expanded. Maryland is just beginning to benefit from technical assistance on universal design that has the potential for great results, but meaningful sustainable systems change takes time and resources.

Increase funding and set higher expectations for federally funded benefits counseling services.

Universal outcome measures should be created across employment funding streams. ODEP could provide leadership with incentive grants to help states create a workstat system.

The Year of the Perfect Storm

2010-01-27T08:34:00.005-05:00

About two weeks ago, First Lady Michelle Obama, spoke to a group at the U.S. Department of Labor. She, in no uncertain terms, talked about the need for our workplaces to catch up with and reflect the realities of our lives. Her statements directly reflect the need for today’s workforce to focus on workplace flexibility as a means to obtaining and retaining a solid and productive work-life balance.

Secretary of Labor, Hilda Solis, remarked on the 19^th Anniversary of the ADA, “And although the federal government strives to be a model employer, in actuality the number of people with disabilities in the federal workforce has decreased over the past decade. This trend must be reversed, and the Department of Labor will be a leader in the effort.” Her statements reflect the acknowledgement that the largest employer in the US needs to step up and make some changes.

Lastly, Christine Griffin, the newly appointed head of the Office of Personnel Management asked all federal agencies to do some introspection and look at their unintended barriers to hiring and advancement, particularly for people with disabilities. She encouraged agency representatives to “start doing some barrier analysis” and discover where the problems exist not only for career advancement, but also for the opportunity to even get in the door.

So, this is the year of the “Perfect Storm.” At this point in history, we have a rare combination of circumstances that has a potential to drastically change a situation. That situation is the overall (generically poor) employment outcomes for people with disabilities. Not only does the Federal Government have the opportunity to do something dynamic, their actions and words have the potential to lay the foundation for states and local areas to do the same. And, as those of us who work (or have worked) on the front lines know, it’s much easier to move a creative vision forward at the local level than it is for the Federal Government. Anyone courageous enough to meet this challenge?

President Roosevelt's Labor Secretary Frances Perkins once pointed out that most of our problems "have been met and solved either partially or as a whole by experiment based on common sense and carried out with courage." Dare I say it’s time to start using common sense?!? If the definition of insanity is to do the same thing over and over again and expect different results, than let’s break the cycle of insanity! Make an opportunity happen…experiment…come up with new ideas…try out a new approach. Slowly but surely those dreadful employment outcomes will change. You might choose one of the following: meet employers in a different way; assist others develop the skills they need to find their own jobs rather than focusing on “job placement;” develop a new relationship with a community workforce partner; or just simply step outside of your comfort zone to make something exciting happen.

If what you’ve been doing to assist people with disabilities get to work isn’t working…and if your relationships with employers are getting stale, find the courage to try a new approach. Most importantly, share your stories with NTAR and let them know the progress you’re making. They have a direct line to the Federal Government….and would be thrilled to share your successes. Who knows? Maybe one of your courageous ideas could be planted as a “seed of change” at the Federal level. After all, we’ve got nowhere to go but up.

Lisa Stern

Stern Consulting, LLC

Strategy Spotlight: Employer Engagement

2010-01-19T14:50:00.002-05:00

Engaging employers is an ongoing challenge for the workforce development system at large, and particularly challenging during this current national recession. While a wide array of employment preparation programs and work experience initiatives are available that assist adults, including those with disabilities, in getting jobs, these programs must coordinate their efforts with employers to ultimately be successful. States in the State Leaders Innovation Institute and State Peer Leaders Network are experimenting with a variety of approaches to overcome this obstacle. Strategies used by states range from primarily informal, one-time communication and information dissemination to employers designed to educate and inform them about existing services and activities, to more intensive engagements and formal relationships that may involve assigning dedicated staff resources to help employers screen, recruit, train, hire, and retain potential employees. The NTAR Leadership Center is currently working with the U.S. Department of Labor-sponsored national technical assistance center for employers on the employment of people with disabilities, managed by Cornell University, and the U.S. Business Leadership Network, to identify promising practices and effective methods for engaging employers.

Listen to the Audio Podcast interview with John Kemp, Executive Director of the U.S. Business Leadership Network about their employer engagement efforts

Read the transcript of the interview with John Kemp

State Spotlight: New Mexico

2010-01-19T12:03:00.007-05:00

Focusing on Abilities is New Mexico’s initiative that works to better coordinate and enhance a more comprehensive and coordinated system of employment services and supports for New Mexicans with disabilities. Its 26-member leadership board is comprised of federal and state government agency representatives (e.g., human services, workforce, education/vocational rehabilitation, Governor’s Commission on Disabilities, etc.) as well as people with disabilities, advocacy organizations, and business leaders. Most recently, New Mexico has stepped up its efforts to better align state economic development activities and the business community with its “to-work” efforts for individuals with disabilities. To this end, the leadership board is working closely with the New Mexico Business Leadership Network (BLN) to lead the charge in "creating best practices as next practices in disability employment through a collaborative effort and a mutual understanding of needs, goals, and resources." To kick off this new direction, the New Mexico BLN recently brought in John Kemp, Executive Director of the USBLN, to join high-ranking state workforce, small business, and economic development officials; employers; and members of the Focusing on Abilities leadership for a discussion about next steps in partnering. “There is something wonderful happening here in New Mexico,” stated John Kemp, “and the nation deserves to hear about it.” A significant part of their activities includes working closely with the federal government, a major employer in the state, to gain access to the system of federal hiring at such locations as Kirtland Air Force Base and the U.S. Forest Service, Region 3.

Read about New Mexico's efforts from Guest Blogger Michelle Gonzalez from Verizon Wireless and member of the New Mexico Business Leadership Board of Directors

Listen to the audio podcast interview with Randy Richardson from Jobing.com and member of the New Mexico Business Leadership Network Board of Directors

Read the transcript of the interview with Randy Richardson

Listen to the audio podcast interview with John Kemp, Executive Director and General Counsel of the U.S. Business Leadership Network

Read the transcript of the interview with John Kemp

Preparation and Promise and the Importance of Being Relevant

2010-01-19T11:47:00.004-05:00

I sit down to write this as the New Year begins. January is always a month of reflection for me, and this year is no different. Thinking back on 2009, working with state leaders through a still struggling economy, continued rising unemployment, renewed terrorist threats, and now the devastation in Haiti. It is a lot to take in. Yet, I am approaching 2010 optimistic about the future and our ability – as individuals and as organizations - to make some headway into what seems to be the intractable problem of unemployment and underemployment of people with disabilities. And I believe, as always, our solutions lie within us - as persevering people - to continue to plow through but perhaps with a more single minded focus, and a notion that we have to make the preparation for work, and the promise of jobs a mantra.

Preparation and promise. For me, this means continuing to talk about the importance of preparing all of our young people and adults, especially those with disabilities, for a world of work and inclusion in our nation’s economic prosperity. Good or great things just don’t always happen by luck or circumstance in our lives – they happen because many of us (and our parents, friends and family – maybe even our public policy makers) understand the importance of preparation. Promise is about opportunity and the promise of potential new jobs and new opportunities that await those who are prepared. This may be my optimism or perhaps my advancing age, but economies like play sets always have swings. There will be jobs in the future, but they just might not be the jobs in place today, and they just won’t appear without any concerted, focused effort to create them. As such, it is vitally important that we internalize the importance of making our systems change efforts relevant. That is, if there is going to be any progress, our efforts must be relevant to employers so that job training is based on jobs that employers foresee needing to fill. If there is going to be any progress, our efforts must be relevant to governors and public officials who will be focusing on creating jobs and supporting business development. And, if there is going to be any progress, our efforts must be relevant to every person with a disability who would like to leave dependency on government programs behind and get a job.

Kathy Krepcio
Director, NTAR Leadership Center

Going Viral

2009-12-21T16:52:00.004-05:00

The fear of hiring people with disabilities stems from a number of reasons and not just one single preconceived notion. This fear often originates from unknowns such as cost or liability. This is unfortunate because almost one-third of ADA accommodation can be met at zero cost and liability is actually greater when not hiring an individual with a disability. Fortunately, this fear can be overcome.

I work for a large corporation that values diversity and believes that its strength comes from a diverse culture. Knowing that this company operates with these beliefs has allowed me to create a truly diverse recruiting strategy with an emphasis on building and sustaining an inclusive workforce. Unsure of where to begin, I was pointed in the direction of the New Mexico Business Leadership Network (NMBLN). Their efforts, assistance, direction, and support was invaluable in building the foundation to our success.

By building meaningful relationships within the community, we were easily able to identify the resources that would help us connect with qualified individuals seeking employment. Before long, I had job seekers, agencies, and employers were all reaching out directly to me to learn more about opportunities for recruiting, hiring, and retaining people with disabilities. Additionally, my peers across the nation were also contacting us with questions about recruiting strategies and training implementation.

This small effort by one person in a small city has gone viral. We all have the ability to truly make a difference when it comes to building an inclusive workforce. Disability does not equal inability. Employees with disabilities often have higher production and retention rates along with lower absenteeism rates. Our employees are focused, dedicated, and loyal.

Due to a collaborative effort by business leaders, the community, and organizations like the New Mexico Business Leadership Network, companies are looking to hire qualified people with disabilities. It takes all of us working together and combining our thoughts, ideas, and resources, to overcome the barriers of fear. By getting involved, staying involved, sharing experiences and asking questions, we have the collective strength to make a very real difference. We have a powerful impact on disability employment.

Michelle M. Gonzalez
Human Resources Professional
Board Member, New Mexico Business Leadership Network

Equal Employment for All

2009-12-14T17:14:00.005-05:00

When will Equal Employment for men and women with disabilities become a reality and not just a few words that are part of some article written in the month of October for National Disability Employment Awareness month? When will the unemployment rate that this community faces every day become a number we can live with rather than a statistic no one cares or does something about? When will the people in the Federal, State and City Governments start hiring people with disabilities and not just tell others to do it? We have seen the Rehabilitation Act and the ADA not make opportunities for this community become more plentiful. Today we stand as the greatest country in the world, with some very smart people. Why do we allow our disabled citizens to be underemployed or unemployed and have no voice regarding their future? Have you ever gone to a party where someone didn’t ask what you did for a living? Would you want to answer I receive Social Security? The solution to the issue of putting our disabled community to work must be an issue we take seriously. Steps must be put in place to right this wrong. First, we must get corporate America to sit at the table, and we must have our Human Resource Professionals include disability management into the daily framework of their positions. We must make funding available for the organizations entrusted with preparing this community for employment with the tools they need to succeed; vocational counselors must be able to have access to the latest in technology, training and human resource education available. We must stop training people for jobs that no longer exist in this economy and prepare them for positions that will provide for family sustaining income and career advancement. We must bring corporations and the world of vocational education closer together and to trust one another. When a vocational counselor tells a corporate recruiter “I have the best person for the job” they truly are the best person for the job.

Jeff Klare rides 300 miles to promote the Employment of men and women with disabilities, led by Eric Madeus an 8 year old. Eric one day will be seeking employment

He noted that what happens now would likely affect Eric Madaus, 8, who suffers from Spina Bifida, and other young people with disabilities. They will need, and want to hold meaningful jobs in the future.

Madaus, from the D.C. area, led Klare to the finish line on a special bike.

“If not now, when?” Klare asked. “If companies don’t look to employ people with disabilities now, what’s his future going to be like?”

Jeff Klare
CEO, Hire Disability Solutions, LLC

Supporting Job Creation Efforts for People with Disabilities in New Jersey

2009-12-10T11:47:00.003-05:00

As we look at a devastated economy with real unemployment rates hovering over 18% for all workers, we know that the situation for workers with disabilities is even more dire.

In the past, the biggest issues for people with disabilities might have been accessibility and having the appropriate training and preparation for demand jobs. However, according to US Department of Labor statistics, we are now seeing 27 million more people than there are jobs available—6 people for every job opening. Clearly, while accessibility, education and training are important, an even bigger priority is the creation of new jobs to overcome the massive losses we’ve sustained in the past 10 years.

So how do we support job creation for people with disabilities? In part through supporting the entrepreneurial aspirations of people with disabilities.

New Jersey, through its MIG-funded DiscoverAbilty NJ project is targeting entrepreneurship in three ways.

NJ BLN Disability Supplier Diversity Program
First, we are working with the US and the NJ Business Leadership Network (USBLN and NJBLN) to deploy their Disability Supplier Diversity Program. Through this project, businesses can apply for a “disability-owned” designation that will be independently certified by the NJBLN. This designation will then be marketed to consumers and businesses so that they can patronize companies that have the Disability Supplier Diversity credential.

Entrepreneurship Mentoring Project
New businesses tend to fail within the first three years after start-up. However, with proper mentoring and support, new entrepreneurs can avoid many of the pitfalls that can challenge so many fledgling businesses. The Entrepreneurship Mentoring project will connect new business owners with more experienced businesses for mentoring and support during this critical time.

Innovations Fund
As part of the DiscoverAbility NJ project, we will also be funding smaller, innovative projects throughout the State. Nonprofits and other organizations can apply for the funding and priority will be given to projects that support entrepreneurship for individuals with disabilities in New Jersey.

We’re excited about the possibilities of building entrepreneurial opportunities for people with disabilities and providing them with the support they need to embark on successful self-employment. Job creation is a critical component of all of our workforce development efforts in New Jersey and support for the entrepreneurial aspirations of people with disabilities is a key piece of that puzzle.

If you have other ideas for how we can support entrepreneurship, please leave us a note in the Comments section of this post or drop me a line at michelemmartin@gmail.com

Resources on Entrepreneurship for Individuals with Disabilities

Michele Martin
DiscoverAbility NJ Project Coordinator

Common Challenges and Opportunities for Collaboration

2009-12-01T14:22:00.004-05:00

I am a member of the Connecticut Team, one of three states selected to receive a grant from the NTAR Leadership Center to participate in a 15-month State Leaders Innovation Institute (SLII). One of our team goals is to have the state of Connecticut become a model employer for people with disabilities. In my professional life I am employed as a Human Resources Consultant in the Department of Administrative Services which houses the statewide human resources management division. Some of the functions my division is responsible for include: setting human resources policies for the state, developing job descriptions, administering merit examinations, conducting collective bargaining grievances, and providing consultation to all state agencies on the entire spectrum of human resources matters from employment to termination and everything in between. As a person who has done a lot of work with employees who have disabilities throughout my career this is the goal I am most committed to.

Thanks to the NTAR Leadership Center, I recently had the opportunity to attend The Governor’s Forum on Disability and Economic Development in Roanoke, VA. I was very excited about attending because I was looking forward to seeing what success Virginia had in closing the employment gap for persons with disabilities and I was hoping to get a few ideas that maybe we could adopt in Connecticut. (The later being very important to me as I don’t believe in reinventing the wheel!)

Virginia has high hopes and incredibly motivated leadership, but advancing employment goals in this economy is challenging at best. Virginia is approaching this issue in a similar fashion to Connecticut and faces many of the same challenges. I learned at the conference that while Virginia has great resources available for people with disabilities, it is difficult to get the word out about these resources. It struck me that someone - who was involved in the disability employment field and was attending this conference - was not aware of all of the resources available. This is one of the many challenges that states face; we not only need to make resources available, we need to get these resources to those who need them, especially during these tough economic times.

So while I didn’t learn new strategies to approach the issue of employment, I did get something I consider ever better… networking contacts. I met and talked extensively with my HR counterpart in state government, I networked with many people from other agencies that provide services to or work with peoples with disabilities such as the department of Rehabilitative services, the workforce development board, department for the Blind and Vision impaired, Virginia Tech University and Northrop Grumman Corporation. These contacts I consider to be invaluable, especially since I’ve already been able to tap into the expertise of at least one of them. I also left with the feeling that as an employer the state of Connecticut is doing much better that I thought we were.

My sincere appreciation and gratitude to the NTAR Leadership Center for providing me with this wonderful opportunity.

Francine E. Dew
Human Resources Consultant, State of Connecticut

Reflections on USBLN Conference

2009-11-30T15:35:00.006-05:00

I had the privilege of attending the United States Business Leadership Network’s ® (USBLN) National Conference in National Harbor Maryland in September thanks to the NTAR Leadership Center. I, as Executive Director, and Regina Stankaitis, as President, represented the Connecticut Business Leadership Network, an association of small, medium and large businesses committed to maximizing employment for people with disabilities.

A major theme of the conference was maximizing the amount of the 220 billion dollars of disposable income of people with disabilities that business could acquire. Presenters discussed marketing to people with disabilities outside of the business and within. For example, Nordstrom’s featured its catalogue ads with disabled models as well as its lighting which makes its goods more accessible to people with disabilities. Ernst and Young talked about its role with the USBLN ® in developing a pilot program to certify disability owned businesses like minority and women owned businesses. Many employers presented strategies for hiring qualified candidates with disabilities. Randy Lewis of Walgreens talked about universality in workplace accommodations - a modification to a tracking system for people with intellectual disabilities made everyone 20% more productive.

What continues to strike me is that businesses "get it" about disability. Disability rights advocates no longer need to make the business case for hiring people with disabilities. They make it to each other. They understand that good customer service to people with disabilities generalizes to better customer service. They understand that good management of people with disabilities and workplace accommodations translates to good management overall.

I was recently at a meeting where human service professionals and disability advocates were discussing job carving. They explained that this involved dividing a job up so that it included functions that could be done by a person with an intellectual disability. A retired insurance executive exclaimed “that’s not ‘job carving’. It is just what good managers do.” This awareness extends well beyond the small number of companies that disability advocates consider when naming disability-positive companies. It extends to all businesses that want to be on the cutting edge when looking at ways to maximize their bottom line.

Melissa Marshall, Executive Director
Connecticut Business Leadership Network

Reflections on Working with States

2009-11-23T09:00:00.002-05:00

For the past couple of years, I have directed the activities of the Center for Workers with Disabilities. CWD is a technical assistance center for state Medicaid Infrastructure Grant projects that is housed in the National Association of State Medicaid Directors, an affiliate of the American Public Human Services Association. CWD is also part of the NTAR Leadership Center consortium. I came to the field of disability employment with experience in welfare reform, workforce development for low-income families, and youth development. Each of these areas has given me useful insights that help enhance efforts to promote employment of people with disabilities.

Welfare reform demonstrated the value of providing states with flexibility to craft “to work” policies and programs. The welfare reform experiences of states have given us lessons on what works (and doesn’t work) to support low-income families in employment. The field of workforce development has pioneered important new approaches, such as industry-based or sectoral employment strategies, that show real promise for creating pathways to good jobs and that states are beginning to incorporate into their disability employment efforts. The field of youth development uses an “SOS” framework – Services, Opportunities, and Supports. I think this concept can be applied broadly to support human capital development for all youth, and also for adults with barriers to employment.

Working with Medicaid Infrastructure Grant (MIG) projects provides a unique opportunity to be part of an “infrastructure development” initiative. MIG funds are used to support system-building activities designed to make lasting change to health and employment systems for people with disabilities. This, along with flexibility in the use of funds, has enabled states to improve coordination across complex systems, build leadership at the state level, develop policies and programs to better support access to health care and employment, and experiment with new approaches to employment for youth and adults with disabilities.

It’s no surprise then that a number of MIG projects are taking part in the NTAR Leadership Center’s activities, including the State Leaders Innovation Institute and the State Peer Leaders Network. Through the NTAR Leadership Center, we are able to support state leaders in bridging workforce development and disability employment initiatives, and in connecting to broader state economic development efforts. And through CWD and the NTAR Leadership Center, we are able to facilitate state-to-state peer exchange and networking, which is proving an invaluable component to supporting innovation in the field.

2010 will be an important year for MIGs and other disability employment efforts. If health care reform legislation is enacted, it will make significant change to Medicaid and private insurance with important implications for people with disabilities. Additionally, with the expiration of MIG funding in 2011, 2010 will be a pivotal year for “telling the story” of the MIGs and addressing sustainability. I look forward to working with our states and partners to build long-term sustainability for state systems change efforts.

Nanette Relave
Director, Center for Workers with Disabilities
American Public Human Services Association

Insights from National Research

2009-11-19T08:12:00.010-05:00

Many of us who work in the field of employment supports for people with disabilities often become frustrated by the ongoing high rates of unemployment (and underemployment) for people with disabilities. We see ourselves toiling year after year to get more people employed, and wish that employment was a reality for all persons with disabilities. We see the positive outcomes of working, and wonder why so few people with disabilities are gainfully employed.

Part of the problem is that we have been working primarily on the supply side – working to improve the supply of ready and able workers. As a field, we have not paid enough attention to the demand side. We have not created the need for workers with disabilities among employers. As a co-author of the soon to be released NTAR Leadership Center research report "Ready and Able," I had the opportunity to visit and learn about a number of exciting and innovative demand-side programs bringing people with disabilities into the workforce on a broad scale. As I visited these programs and interviewed people involved in these projects, including persons with disabilities, I was impressed by the vision and ingenuity of the businesses and employment organizations.

In this blog entry, I will highlight a couple of them and share some impressions and questions. Project SEARCH at the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital has resulted in many people becoming employed and gaining work experiences. Project SEARCH was initiated by Erin Reihle, RN, from Cincinnati Children’s Hospital, and has been replicated across the globe, moving into fields other than health care, and offering a promising model for blending demand and supply to bring people with disabilities into the workforce.

Our research project offers an in-depth profile of a replication occurring at Monmouth Medical Center in Red Bank, NJ, showing how the model can be adapted to meet individual employer needs. The New Bedford, MA Chamber of Commerce’s Supported Employment Network offers an example of a unique partnership between the business community and local disability employment organizations, with funding from the local office of the state developmental disability support agency. This collaboration has resulted in hundreds and hundreds of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities working and contributing their labor to the community and local economy.

These two efforts, along with the other profiles created in our research project, document unique, business-led effort to gain valuable employees from diverse groups and create pipelines for hiring workers. As such, these efforts also assure that Americans with disabilities can enjoy the same benefits of work as most other people, both monetary and personal.

The question is, why are these great collaborations the exception rather than the rule? Don’t businesses want good employees? Don’t people with disabilities want to work?

The easy answer for this is that it requires people to reach out to different communities. Businesses usually talk to other business. When the local branch of the state developmental disability state agency in New Bedford, MA reached out to the Chamber of Commerce, there was a positive response, as the director of the Chamber at that time was already involved in the community above and beyond representing business interests. A failure to collaborate on either part would have doomed this project. Openness to difference, however, will result in the meeting of supply and demand, and in our research profiles, we have given a number of wonderful examples of this.

Dan Baker
Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at the Elizabeth M. Boggs Center on Developmental Disabilities
Co-Investigator, NTAR Leadership Center National Research

NTAR Leadership Center National Research: Ready and Able

2009-11-06T09:18:00.002-05:00

Over the last year or so, I have been working on an exciting research project through the NTAR Leadership Center. My colleagues and I are profiling market-driven practices that promote employment for people with disabilities. We have been especially interested in learning about partnerships with employers that lead to increased hiring, retention, promotion or accommodation of people with disabilities. At this point, we have completed our field visits, interviews and other research, and we are now in the process of writing up what we found in a report to be called, “Ready and Able.”

While all of the people we spoke to in doing our research have a common belief that people with disabilities can work and want to work, the word that comes to mind to describe our research is “diversity.” For a start, our research team is comprised of people with different backgrounds. I have experience primarily with the “mainstream” workforce development system, and my two colleagues – Bob Nicholas and Dan Baker – have extensive experience with disability systems. The experience of seeing the subjects of our profiles through these different lenses has enriched the research and led to greater understanding of diverse perspectives.

We have found amazing diversity in the approaches we are profiling. Employers partner and collaborate to employ people with disabilities in so many different ways. We are seeing collaborations between major national employers and public sector agencies. Some models focus on a particular industry or occupational sector, in partnership with public or nonprofit intermediary organizations. We talked to different types of job brokers – a private staffing service and a non-profit “Alternative Staffing Organization” – to understand how they work to increase employment of people with disabilities. We found some really great partnerships that expand opportunities for college students and graduates with disabilities. And we also spoke to people working in local and regional hubs that bridge the gap between people with disabilities and employers. We found some great people and organizations working in creative ways to act as catalysts for disability and employment partnerships.

The research also reminded me of the diversity among people with disabilities – so many different types of people, so many different needs and approaches. And we have found, in many cases, that companies are increasingly seeing disability as another dimension of diversity – within their workforces and their customer bases.

While the approaches are varied, there are some important common themes that are emerging. Employers are embracing the business case for employing people with disabilities. They see individuals with disabilities as adding value and positively affecting the company’s or organization’s “bottom line.” One person called this being smart, not nice. The more successful experiences employers have, the more they want to hire people with disabilities. At the same time, employers do not want to have to maintain relationships with many varied disability service organizations. They want a partner to make it easy for them to recruit, hire, train and support people with disabilities. A good partnership or collaboration can serve this function. For a number of companies that have made a clear commitment to disability as diversity, the only question is how best to accomplish this.

Our research has shown me that “diversity” means creativity, great ideas and different approaches that enrich and strengthen the ways in which the private, public and non-profit sectors can work together to increase employment of people with disabilities. Stay tuned for the complete “Ready and Able” report. Meanwhile, tell us about your diverse experiences with partnerships that promote employment for people with disabilities.

Ronnie Kauder
Senior Practitioner in Residence, Heldrich Center
Principal Investigator, NTAR Leadership Center National Research

Conversations with Leaders

2009-11-02T09:00:00.001-05:00

For the past several weeks, I have traveling around the country talking with state officials, business leaders and others about the work they are doing in the disability and employment area, listening to speeches and presentations, and observing the work of very dedicated people trying to figure out how they can crack the employment problem. While traveling, I have had so many interesting conversations, and listened to some presentations that were really thought provoking – I wanted to share a few with you.

My conversation with Terry Donovan who works on Pathways to Employment in Minnesota about the ‘diffusion of innovation’ theory and strategies for effectively moving pilot projects to national implementation successfully. We also talked about how to inculcate piloted local and state practices from their research and development phase into new ways of doing business. Terry and all the other folks in Minnesota we work with through our Center give me so many ‘aha’ moments when we talk that I always want to stay in Minnesota (except for that winter thing they have going there).

My talk with Michelle Martin (a women with enormous creative energy who has her own blog called ‘The Bamboo Project’ and who is assisting New Jersey with their disability employment efforts) was about the need to look at, and work with, jobseekers in terms of their ‘employment readiness’ versus some stereotype or silo like ‘disability’, ‘low income’, ‘TANF recipient’, or ‘dislocated worker’. Michelle is a rockstar! and is teaching me a lot about Web 2.0 technology and communications and all that energy – wow!

My discussions with folks in New Mexico about the necessity, if not the imperative, of objectively evaluating our employment programs and practices. My colleague at the Heldrich Center, Bill Mabe, and I recently presented at the Southwest Conference on Disability about what you need to know to structure an effective, user friendly evaluation (the presentation can be found on the Heldrich Center website www.heldrich.rutgers.edu). I can’t say enough about the need to really know if the services and supports everyone is working on really are making a difference, or whether we are so emotionally attached to what we are doing that we can’t objectively see that some things just are not working very well.

Finally, I was recently presenting with Dana Egretsky from the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce (who also runs the New Jersey Business Leadership Network) in Atlantic City at a state conference on autism. Dana and I were scheduled to discuss the New Jersey economy, what employers are looking for, and how to best prepare for the world of work. We both realized that the presentation we were about to give was, most likely, going to be somewhat depressing given the poor employment outlook and how difficult it is to be upbeat when the reality of the job market is a bit bleak. What can you say except get a skill, stay in school, be positive and slog through it? Clearly, there are not a lot of easy answers for jobseekers right now. Yet conversations like these continue to make me realize how there are great people out in the field who are thinking about how to make changes, who want to have an honest dialogue about the status quo and challenges to real change, and who sincerely want to make a difference.

Kathy Krepcio

Director, NTAR Leadership Center

Disability Employment Policy in Virginia

2009-10-23T09:00:00.002-04:00

I am very grateful to the NTAR Leadership Center for giving me this opportunity to be a guest blogger. This week I will share a little about what’s been happening in Virginia over the past three years to improve employment options for our citizens with disabilities especially those with significant disabilities. This has long been a passion of mine throughout my career in many fields serving people who have disabilities.

This passion grew inside of me while serving as a Special Educator in the 70’s, a Peer Counselor at a Center for Independent Living throughout the 80’s, and a Training Associate at the Rehabilitation Research and Training Center on the campus of Virginia Commonwealth University during the 90’s through the mid 2000’s. In all these roles I encouraged my customers (a term I prefer over clients or consumers because it challenges me to serve folks to their satisfaction) to seek gainful competitive employment to maximize their opportunity to live independently in the community. These jobs allowed me to assist people one-on-one or in groups through counseling and training sessions to learning the skills they needed to find and maintain meaningful careers. Although these jobs were very satisfying and I was able to help a lot of people I wanted to do something that would have a lasting impact on employment policy for people with disabilities. This opportunity came my way during the summer of 2006 through a gubernatorial appointment.

Shortly after my part time Appointment as the Governor’s Special Advisor on Disability issues in the Workforce I had the opportunity to sit down with Governor Kaine to discuss his expectations of my role. He immediately charged me with the task of identifying a disability issue where he could make a significant impact on during his Administration and could use as his thumb print in making a difference. I responded immediately which I believed surprised him a little. I said Governor Kaine there is no issue more important to Virginians with Disabilities than having the right to work, earn a good wage and live in the community with other citizens. With that we shook hands and he sent me on my way “to get it done.”

I began working on this task by checking into disability employment programs that were already in place and seeing if there were any opportunities for collaboration. This investigation led to a meeting between the Departments’ of Veterans Affairs, Rehabilitative Services (DRS), Virginia Employment Commission and a veterans employment initiative housed at the Virginia Department of Transportation. The Governor's Office on Workforce was also represented by the Senior Advisor on Workforce Daniel LeBlanc and me. During this meeting each agency described what services they provided to assist people and veterans with disabilities to enter into meaningful careers. The meeting ended with agencies agreeing to find more effective ways to collaborate.

This initial meeting was probably the spring board for the Secretary of Public Safety appointing a taskforce to look at ways to increase employment for wounded veterans returning to Virginia from Iraqi and Afghanistan. Mr. LeBlanc, DRS Commissioner Rothrock, and other employment stakeholders including me worked on the taskforce to develop recommendations which are currently being implemented. These recommendations are intended to improve career options for Virginia’s wounded warriors.

The second major activity that I worked on was a Public-Private Partnership grant (from the Board for People with Disabilities) project. This innovative project was facilitated by the Rehabilitation Research and Training Center at Virginia Commonwealth University. It involved Temporary Staffing Companies working with DRS, the Department for the Blind and Visually Impaired and selected Employment Service Organizations to increase employment opportunities in state government for qualified employees with disabilities.

This unique project had the strong support of the Governor who issued Executive Directive #8 to reinforce his commitment to hiring qualified employees with disabilities in state government. ED #8 ordered all state agencies, colleges and universities to examine their hiring policies and remove any that might be barriers to hiring or promoting qualified applicants/employees with disabilities. In addition the Chief of Staff issued a memorandum encouraging all human resource managers to attend training developed by project staff in collaboration with the Virginia Department of Human Resource Management (DHRM) to assist them in implementing ED#8. Lastly the directive requires all state agencies and institutions of higher learning to report to the Secretary of Administration annually on their progress in implementing thee Directive.

Another major responsibility of the Special Advisor is to serve on the Executive Management Committee of Virginia’s Disability Program Navigator Project. In this role I serve as a resource to EMC members, Navigators, WIB Directors, and Workforce Center Managers on program and physical accessibility issues. Our Medicaid Works program has been a strong partner and resource for our state’s very successful Disability Program Navigator project along with DRS and the Workforce Office currently housed in the Virginia Community College System (VCCS). These collaborative efforts enabled Virginia to compete for a unique grant opportunity that would present its self in the spring of 2008.

In the spring of 08’ Daniel LeBlanc came across a very unique grant opportunity that he believed would enhance employment opportunities for Virginians with significant disabilities. This opportunity was being provided by a US Department of Labor grant awarded to the National Technical Assistance Research (NTAR Leadership Center) Project at Rutgers University’s John J. Heldrich Center for Workforce Development. The purpose of the institute would be to assist disability and workforce development stakeholders to use innovative approaches in increasing employment options for people with disabilities in their states. The Governor’s Workforce Office along with our partners from DRS enthusiastically set about the task of developing the proposal. We also received input from members of a state team that I had formed as a part of the grant process. Our state team comprised of representatives from businesses, state agencies, academics, an Employment Service Organization and employees with disabilities.

Unfortunately, we were notified in late spring that we were not selected as one of the three states. However, our proposal was strong enough to entitle our state team to receive technical assistance from the NTAR Leadership Center on two priority areas to be selected by our team. We chose; building relationships with the economic development community to increase employment options for citizens with disabilities and turning entrepreneurial opportunities into meaningful careers for Virginians with disabilities. However, as we began receiving technical assistance in July 2008 the team seemed to focus on the first one because it seemed to have the greatest potential of bearing the most fruit.

During the second technical assistance session, NTAR Leadership Center Director Kathy Krepcio announced that the NTAR Leadership Center would like to assist the Virginia team in carrying on its work due to its commitment in implementing several activities identified in its first TA session. The plan is also included as a part of this Blog.

As team leader I had no doubt what I wanted and felt we needed. I proposed to my team that we hold a statewide forum with all the major employment stakeholders and include employees with disabilities and the Economic Development Community in our discussions. I believed such a forum would assist me in answering the Governor’s charge by giving him a tangible product he could point to as an achievement of his Administration. The purpose of the Forum would be to develop a blueprint on ways to reduce the horrific unemployment rate among Virginians with significant disabilities. The team approved my recommendation at our March 2009 meeting and I appointed a committee to begin the work of planning this uniquely different forum. The Planning Committee, chaired by Howard Green from the RRTC/VCU, began its work in earnest in mid April. The Planning Committee came up with an excellent day and a half agenda to ensure the Forum would complete its work. COFFEY Consulting assisted us with the logistical aspects associated with holding such an event.

The Governor’s Disability and Economic Development Forum was held September 15th & 16th at the beautiful and Historic Hotel Roanoke. It was kicked off with a welcome video by Governor Kaine who charged the 80 attendees to come up with this great document. We had four excellent facilitators who assisted attendees to come up with the ideas and recommendations. To do this they developed three discussion topics and attendees were assigned to a topical group without consideration to their background or stakeholder interest. The Planning Committee believed this would encourage free thinking and a wide variety of ides being generated without stakeholders having to be concerned about turf issues. These discussion topics are listed below:

Discussion topic 1 – Employment Opportunities

In your experience, what are Virginia’s greatest strengths in creating employment opportunities for people with disabilities?
What activities are occurring within the workforce and economic development systems that could be built upon to increase employment opportunities for people with disabilities?

Discussion Topic 2 – Leveraging Strengths and Resources Over the next five years, what would it take for Virginia to become a world leader in leveraging the strengths of people with disabilities and the workforce/economic development systems to:

Create employment opportunities for people with disabilities?
Expand the pool of qualified applicants who are ready and willing to work for relocating companies and new businesses?

Discussion topic 3 – Promising Strategies What are the three most promising strategies that your group would recommend? Currently the planning committee is in the process of reviewing the blueprint so it is very doubtful that it would be a part of the blog at this time because I believe other member of our team need to review it before it becomes public. However as soon as it is approved by the entire team I will make sure Kathy Krepcio gets a copy that she can share with those of you who have an interest in seeing it.

I have pledged to our team to work with Daniel LeBlanc to see that this blue print is delivered to Governor Kaine and appropriate members of his Administration in a timely manner. I will also work with appropriate staff to see that it is handed over to the Transition Team for the incoming Administration. However, I want to make it clear to other Virginia Employment advocates that they also have a responsibility! After Danny and I have gone on our way you must keep inquiring of the next Administration and the ones to come in the future about the implementation of this blue print. Remember qualified employees with disabilities are depending on you to be vigilant.

Thank you for taking time to read the information in this blog and I look forward to responding to your questions and having a real productive dialog on the important topic of how to increase employment options for people with disabilities.

Thank you,

Ed Turner
Governor Kaine’s Special Advisor on Disability Issues in the Workforce

Reflections on Workforce Investment Act (WIA) Reauthorization

2009-10-19T16:19:00.009-04:00

On October 1, 2009, I had the privilege of participating in a USDOL national listening session on how the reauthorization of the Workforce Investment Act (WIA) can be used as an opportunity to improve the ability of the workforce system to serve jobseekers with disabilities. According to the Labor Department’s press release, over 700 people participated either in person or via webinar, an indication both that people think WIA reauthorization may actually happen in the year ahead, after several years where it has not been a priority issue, and that there are many opinions of how the One Stops and workforce system can be more responsive to people with disabilities.

I will share several impressions from that day.

First, it was exciting to see the two Assistant Secretaries—Jane Oates from the Employment and Training Administration (ETA), and Kathy Martinez, from the Office of Disability Employment Policy (ODEP) – sitting side by side. Aside from the fact that they appeared to be enjoying each other’s company, and that they stayed for the entire 3-hour event, the picture of them sitting together seems to send a message that disability employment is clearly on the agenda at ETA. I have had the chance to see (the always dynamic) Assistant Secretary Oates speak in public several times where she has emphasized the importance of interagency collaboration at the federal level, especially between the USDOL and the US Department of Education. It’s great to see this collaborative spirit also applies in-house to the various agencies within the Labor Department itself. It also fits in perfectly with what the NTAR Leadership Center is promoting around cross-agency partnerships and collaboration at the state level.

Many of the day’s 21 speakers spent their five minutes discussing contributions made by Disability Program Navigators. In preparing my remarks, Kathy Krepcio and I decided to primarily focus on the tremendous efforts made by the three states in our State Leaders Innovation Institute, Maryland, Minnesota and Connecticut. We reflected on issues these states and others have raised repeatedly about some of the challenges people with disabilities face as a result of a fragmented workforce development system, with its various programs that sometimes result in contradictory messages about employment expectations for people with disabilities. We hope that a reauthorized WIA can make some progress towards a unified federal policy affirming that people with disabilities are an integral part of the nation’s workforce, and that there can be better alignment across traditional labor, education, and health and human services agencies at all levels to promote employment of people with disabilities.

When we launched the SLII, the Great Recession was just beginning to take hold of the American economy. In the months since then, and with the prospect of high unemployment continuing for months if not years to come, people often raise the issue of how the workforce system can possibly hope to better serve people with disabilities, with so very many non-disabled jobseekers in the labor market. In watching our states go about their work, I’m coming to think we need to learn from their example that jobseekers are jobseekers first, regardless of their unique challenges, and that the workforce system has as much of an obligation to serve people with disabilities as it does any jobseekers.

On a side note: Two of my kids have recently taken up fencing, and we were all interested to read an article in the front section of the New York Times about young fencers who are in wheelchairs. Fencing is a popular sport in our home state of New Jersey, and it was great to see that the New Jersey Fencing Alliance has invested in making wheelchair fencing, which traces its roots to returning World War II veterans, available in our area.

Maria Heidkamp,

Senior Research Project Manager at the Heldrich Center

and Director of the NTAR Leadership Center's State Leaders Innovation Institute

Employer Collaboration and Coordination

2009-10-09T09:00:00.000-04:00

Today, publicizing our work and organizations through “new media” such as LinkedIn, Facebook, and YouTube has become the norm. Like many of you (and if you haven’t already you will soon), I completed media training and found myself on blogs, podcasts, and videos. Now I admit I find technology interesting and am pretty savvy about promoting my work as a grants officer at Kessler Foundation, which funds employment opportunities for people with disabilities through our “Transition to Work” initiative. Yet, I often find myself suffering from information overload — too many sites to visit and so little time.

Now just imagine you are the hiring manager at a local company. It is particularly overwhelming from a human resource perspective to recruit job seekers with disabilities. Where are they? It is common knowledge that an employer’s willingness to hire individuals with disabilities is ultimately influenced by easy access to a large job pool of qualified applicants.

Some employers may turn to the Internet. Web access has spurred the growth of job boards specifically marketing to people with disabilities. Sites such as hireability.com, gettinghired.com, and hireds.com, enable consumers to post resumes and apply for advertised jobs. Companies seeking recent college graduates look to cosdonline.org and limeconnect.com.

State vocational rehabilitation (VR) programs and community rehabilitation providers are forming new marketing initiatives with business to promote recruitment and hiring of people with disabilities. In New Jersey, the MOSAIC Center Disability Employment, a pilot program funded by Kessler Foundation, is a single point of contact linking job seekers with disabilities with employers seeking qualified workers. It is a no-cost service that matches candidates’ skills and work experience to available job opportunities.

Bergen County College, the lead project partner, recently received federal dollars to expand its outreach beyond the disability community to include other minority populations. What makes this project unique is that the 16 founding partners grew to over 30 cooperating organizations. Its collaborative partners now are a diverse group of for-profit and not-for-profit organizations such as rehabilitation providers, recruitment companies, Chambers of Commerce, One-Stop Career Centers, Workforce Investment Boards, and the New Jersey Department of Labor and Workforce Development.

You may say this concept is nothing new. That is true — except many collaborative employment partnerships remain active only on paper. This group meets face-to-face regularly and actually talks through issues that could throw the project off track. Like anything else, there are challenges, especially in this difficult economy.

MOSAIC is a project that has been operating quietly for almost a year…and seems to be working. It is a win-win project for all — saving employers time by providing skilled job seekers that are screened and appropriate for their openings and connecting greater numbers of people with disabilities to jobs.

Elaine Katz

Vice President of Grant Programs and Special Initiatives, Henry H. Kessler Foundation

Co-author of the NTAR Leadership Center research brief, Collobrating and Coordinating with Employers

Seeding Change and Policymaking

2009-10-01T08:51:00.000-04:00

Greetings, and welcome to the NTAR Leadership Center's new blog called "Seeding Change".

Why seeding change? Because I feel the work we are doing through the Center is about introducing people to new ideas, concepts, knowledge, and most importantly, other people from diverse fields. Our hope is that these 'seeds' will result in fostering new or different approaches -- approaches that will ultimately create jobs and better economic outcomes for adults with disabilities.

I also like the concept of seeding change because I like to garden, and I find that the “systems change” work that we all do is very organic and a lot like gardening. For example, in public policymaking, it is important to have an idea of what you want to accomplish. In gardening, it also helps to start out with a plan and a layout of what you want to grow. Yet, in either case, there’s no guarantee that what you end up with will look anything like what you planned. That is a given. In my garden, I am amazed that every year I approach it in the same way -- I plan it, plant it, prune it, weed it, water it -- and every year it ends up looking different!

I could, of course, rip it all out if what I wanted doesn't work out -- or I can embrace the unexpected, because it may be just as good or better than what I thought would grow. In my garden, I find doing a little bit of both helps. The perennial phlox that I planted several years ago decided to seed itself all over my yard and now comes up in the most unexpected of places. I could dig it up -- but I like its brazenness. On the other hand, my husband and I waged a relentless fight against the potato blight that threatened my Jersey tomatoes this past summer (potato blight and tomatoes? Who knew?). The point is: in gardening, I need to strike a balance between the things I have the power (and desire) to change -- and my willingness to live with the consequences of my actions or inactions. The same is true in making public policy!

When it comes to working in the trenches to reform a system, as many of you are doing, I have come to realize how important it is to be vigilant and pay attention to it every day. While I must admit I am not able to be in my garden on a daily basis weeding, watering, or fertilizing, I recognize that to neglect it for even one day means something is going to run amok. Last year, I somewhat ignored my garden (o.k., really ignored it), and I learned one valuable lesson -- the power of those plants that I do not nurture to take over. In this case, I underestimated the power of Creeping Charlie to take over the yard. And, as many of you who have worked in public policy know, trying to undo what has “taken over” while you weren’t looking is back-breaking, difficult work.

Finally, in both gardening and policymaking, I have found that new ideas can come from unexpected places. Inspiration for my garden can come from anywhere -- the farmers market, talking to friends, or looking at endless magazines. You never know where the muse is. The same goes for changing systems and creating opportunities: inspiration to change -- or to try something new -- can come from the most surprising sources.

Recently, I was talking to my colleague Mary Alice Mowry from Minnesota. Mary Alice was telling me that she had gone to a workshop at the Milwaukee APSE conference in early summer and it really energized her. She said the workshop asked the participants three simple questions. Number one: What time is it? Number two: What do you need to learn, unlearn, and relearn? And Number three: What is your next bold move?

So, as we launch this new blog, I invite each of you to become an active participant in the two-way “conversations” our guest authors will lead every week in this space. In the spirit of change and inspiration, please share your comments and insights, and tell us:

What do YOU need to learn and relearn? What is YOUR next bold move?

Kathy Krepcio

Director, NTAR Leadership Center