Education

Too often youth with and without disabilities do not receive the appropriate education promised to them. The following information is available to assist you in determining ways that you can have an effect on the educational system and can support young people with their educational goals.

Career-Focused Services for Students with Disabilities at Community Colleges

This case study report examines the efforts of community colleges to function as intermediaries in meeting the local workforce development needs of employers and promoting career opportunities and job attainment for students, including those with disabilities.

Charting the Course: Supporting the Career Development of Youth with Learning Disabilities

This Guide is intended to help practitioners, administrators, and policymakers in secondary and postsecondary education programs, transition programs, One-Stop Career Centers, youth employment programs, and community rehabilitation programs to improve services and outcomes for youth, ages 14 to 25, with diagnosed and undiagnosed learning disabilities. This Guide includes numerous quick reference charts, tables, and tools for counselors, career advisors, and other professionals who work directly with youth. In-depth information is provided on a variety of topics, including the types and impact of learning disabilities, needed supports, and research-based interventions. This Guide is intended to increase awareness of the fact that the workforce development system serves many youth who have learning disabilities that may never have been identified and many others who may know they have a learning disability but choose not to disclose. Although focusing primarily on youth with learning disabilities, many of the strategies and approaches advocated in this Guide, which are premised on universal design, may be of practical use for other youth.

Graduation Requirements and Diploma Options for Students with Disabilities: What Families and Advocates Need to Know

This InfoBrief explores the importance of making informed decisions about diploma options, understanding the consequences of graduating with different types of diplomas as well as the need for youth, families, and Individual Education Program (IEP) teams to consider these issues early.

Graduation Requirements and Diploma Options: What Families Need to Know (Dec. 2010/Jan. 2011 article in National PTA Magazine)

This article published in the December 2010/January 2011 issue of Our Children, the National PTA Magazine, provides guidance for parents and families on helping students understand graduation requirements and diploma options. Families play a critical role in helping their children understand the options, define college and career goals, and choose a pathway to earning a diploma. For parents of students with disabilities, it is especially important to understand the differences between the standard diploma and any alternatives offered by the school.

Hidden Disabilities

This guide provides a basic understanding of how to identify and screen for hidden disabilities; connect to formal diagnosis; provide appropriate accommodations; and identify support services.

IDEA Revised: Special Education Law Enacted

After three years of intense debate and compromise, America’s federal statute governing special education has been revised, enacted and, for the most part, will take effect July 2005. The revisions of IDEA contained in the new law, Public Law 108-446, build on and more closely align IDEA with the No Child Left Behind Act. They also modify important requirements around individualized student planning, transition, litigation, and due process protections, monitoring and enforcement, and federal funding. This InfoBrief is a summary of some of the major provisions in the new law.

Improving High School Outcomes for All Youth: Recommendations for Policy & Practice

This brief was informed by over a decade of work by the National Collaborative on Workforce and Disability for Youth (NCWD/Youth) including the white paper, "Preparing All Youth for Academic and Career Readiness: Implications for High School Policy and Practice." This brief calls attention to the need to implement policies and practices that will improve high school and post-school outcomes for all students, including those with diverse learning and support needs. Recommendations for federal, state, and local policy makers are outlined.

Individualized Learning Plans: A Research and Demonstration Project - Summary

This document is a summary of initial findings of a study funded by the U.S. Department of Labor's Office of Disability Employment Policy. The study, launched in the 2008-09 school year and targeted for completion in 2012-13, is the first longitudinal research and demonstration project designed to understand the effectiveness of Individualized Learning Plans.

Personalized Learning: Policy Insights from Four States

This Policy Brief describes findings from a case study of four states using individualized learning plans as a strategic education policy to personalize student’s educational experience in an effort to raise their academic achievement and better prepare them for post-secondary education and employment.

Preparing All Youth for Academic and Career Readiness: Implications for High School Policy and Practice

This paper identifies the challenges in practice and policy for successful post-school outcomes and it offers recommendations on how states, local school districts and individual high schools can prepare all youth, including youth with disabilities, with the academic and career readiness skills. Based on two symposia and a year-long research effort, this paper identifies five broad policy and practice areas: (1) Instruction, Curriculum and Structure; (2) Assessment Practices; (3) Graduation Requirements; (4) Community and Family Connections; and (5) Data Quality Challenges. The paper suggests that by addressing these areas, a range of high school policy makers at the national, state, and local levels can improve their approaches for meeting the multiple and complex challenges of all their students.

Understanding the Role of Individualized Learning Plans in Transition Planning for Youth with Disabilities

This InfoBrief explains how schools and families can supplement the required Individualized Education Program (IEP) by using an optional Individualized Learning Plan (ILP) as a tool to help youth successfully transition from high school to employment and postsecondary education.

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