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May 2008
 Youth And Disability Disclosure: The Role Of Families And Advocates
InfoBrief Issue 21 highlights NCWD/Youth’s The 411 on Disability Disclosure and explores the role families and advocates play in helping youth understand the importance of appropriate disability disclosure. Read InfoBrief Issue 21.
Vocational Assessment And Its Role In Career Planning
InfoBrief Issue 20 discusses career planning and vocational assessment for transition-age youth. It focuses on the vocational domain and how assessment activities support career related activities. Read InfoBrief Issue 20.
Tunnels And Cliffs: A Guide For Workforce Development Practitioners And Policymakers Serving Youth With Mental Health Needs
This brief document summarizes the challenges faced by youth with mental health needs when they enter inappropriate service tunnels dictated by their point of entry and when they encounter transition cliffs as they age out of youth systems and attempt to access adult services. It offers examples of emerging promising practices related to career preparation and employment for youth and offers an action plan to make the coordination of services a cross-systems priority. Read the Tunnels And Cliffs Short Cut.
Navigating Tunnels And Cliffs: Empowering Families And Caregivers To Assist Youth With Mental Health Needs In Preparing For Work
Another brief document that summarizes the challenges facing families and caregivers of youth with mental health needs and the resources available to them in helping a young person prepare for a career and community life. It offers and action plan for parents and caretakers on how to make coordination and collaboration of mental health services and career preparation a priority. Read the Navigating Tunnels And Cliffs Short Cut.
April 2008
Road To Self-Sufficiency: A Guide To Entrepreneurship For Youth With Disabilities
This Guide was developed to serve as a resource for organizations working with youth on career exploration and employment options, and policymakers who support youth programs through policy and practice. The Guide shows how entrepreneurship education can be implemented in programs and offers suggestions on how to introduce self-employment as an option for all youth, including youth with disabilities. In addition, The Road to Self-Sufficiency: A Guide to Entrepreneurship for Youth with Disabilities offers a set of appendices with valuable resources and references. A must read for organizations and practitioners working with all youth, policy-makers, and parents looking for resources and information on economic self-sufficiency for their adolescent children. Read the Entrepreneurship Guide.
March 2008
Youth with Disabilities in the Foster Care System: Barriers to Success and Proposed Policy Solutions
Youth with disabilities who also are in the foster care system are one of the most vulnerable populations in the nation; yet, little attention is focused on the unique challenges they face as they negotiate the curves through multiple systems into adulthood. Last year, NCWD/Youth published a guide, Negotiating the Curves Toward Employment, addressing these issues. Now, the National Council on Disability, with assistance from the American Youth Policy Forum, has issues a companion publication, Youth with Disabilities in the Foster Care System: Barriers to Success and Proposed Policy Solutions.
Universal Design for the Workforce Development System
As public and private workforce development systems strive to meet the diverse needs of their business and career seeking customers, including individuals experiencing barriers to employment, personnel working within these systems need a clear understanding of how to design programs, services, and activities that provide genuine, effective, and meaningful opportunities for all. Universal design for the workforce development system is the design of environments, products, and communication practices as well as the delivery of programs, services, and activities to meet the needs of all customers of the workforce development system. This resource has been developed to assist workforce development policymakers and program operators in assessing their ability to meet the needs of their customers. Read this resource.
President Establishes Interagency Working Group on Youth Programs
On February 7, President Bush signed an Executive Order establishing the Interagency Working Group on Youth Programs, a coalition of Federal agencies that will help support communities and organizations working on behalf of our nation's youth. The order builds on the success of Helping America's Youth, a three-year interagency initiative. Access the Executive Order. For additional information about the Helping America's Youth Initiative, visit its website.
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) Publishes Chafee National Youth in Transition Database: Final Rule
The Administration for Children and Families (ACF) within HHS has published a final rule (PDF) which adds new regulation to require States to collect and report data to ACF on youth who are receiving independent living services and on the outcomes of certain youth who are in foster care or who age out of foster care. The final rule implements the data collection requirements of the Foster Care Independence Act of 1999 (Pub. L. 106-169) as incorporated into the Social Security Act. The effective Date is April 28, 2008. A State must implement and comply with this rule no later than October 1, 2010. View the Federal Register Notice (PDF).
February 2008
The No Child Left Behind Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act: A Progress Report
The National Council on Disability (NCD) recently released a report analyzing the progress of the No Child Left Behind (NCLB) Act and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) that says students with disabilities are no longer ignored. To that end, NCLB and IDEA have had a significant, positive impact. Read the report (published on January 28, 2008).
New High School/High Tech Program Guide
The HS/HT Program Guide is an updated and much expanded version of the HS/HT Program Manual that was produced in 2003. As HS/HT has spread to numerous states, the experiences of these programs and the resultant evolution of the HS/HT program from a locally-administered and implemented program to a state-administered and locally-implemented program have produced a wealth of additional information about the HS/HT program model. As a result, the newly released HS/HT Program Guide is full of information and materials used by the HS/HT programs throughout the country. Read the HS/HT Program Guide.
January 2008
College Navigator named by Money Magazine one of "The 28 Best Money Websites"
College Navigator, the U.S. Department of Education's web site for information about colleges and universities, has been named by Money magazine as "the best first screen" for researching higher education institutions. Navigator was cited in the publication's December 4, 2007, issue, which rated the Top 28 web sites in seven categories -- one of which was college search tools. Money notes that the web site, unlike many other college search tools, is not tied to any marketing department seeking students' personal information. It also credits the web site for being "one of the simplest" to use, for having "a good comparison tool," and for providing "a full set of the latest data on expenses, aid, enrollment, admission and graduation rates, majors, and more, along with a Google map pinpointing location." Launched in September, Navigator is one of several agency resources developed to supply the public with clear and reliable information on the college selection process and federal financial aid. They are part of Secretary Spellings' plan to make the American higher education system more accessible, affordable, and accountable. More information.
Access by Students with Disabilities to Accelerated Programs
The U.S. Department of Education's Office for Civil Rights recently issued a policy letter addressing students with disabilities’ access to Accelerated Programs. Due to reports of schools and districts where qualified students with disabilities have been prevented from participating in these programs, or in some cases were required to give up services and accommodations in order to participate, the Office for Civil Rights reaffirmed their responsibility and commitment to uphold Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 (prohibiting discrimination on the basis of disability in programs or activities receiving Federal financial assistance) and Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (which prohibits discrimination on the basis of disability by entities of State and local government.) and the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act. Section 504 and Title II require that qualified students with disabilities be given the same opportunities to compete for and benefit from accelerated programs and classes as are given to students without disabilities. Read more.
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