Webcast - Jan 27

Developing and Harnessing Social Capital to Achieve Employment Goals - By Nancy Brooks-Lane, M.S., L.M.F.T., L.P.C., Sr Consultant, Center for Social Capital - Individuals with disabilities typically have fewer opportunities to form relationships outside of the disability service system and build social capital. Social Capital benefits and is important to everyone’s career path. Integrating relationship building into each individual’s support plan is a valuable starting point. Social Capital then evolves into practice. Facilitating individuals to develop and enhance their Social Capital is one of the most effective and efficient ways to achieve state and federal policy mandates, such as the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA) and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) Final Rule; and most importantly assist citizens who happen to have a disability to have a working life.
Research Brief

Research Brief: The Voice of Families: Exploring Perspectives on the Pathways to Integrated Employment Like anyone else, youth and adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) want to participate fully in the life of their community. Although there are many different avenues for community inclusion, finding a good job may be among the most impactful. A satisfying job provides opportunities to develop new friendships, share one’s talents, meet the needs of others, learn new skills, and assume valued roles. Moreover, a regular paycheck provides resources for meeting personal needs and makes involvement in other community activities possible. A good job can make a powerful difference in the lives of individuals with IDD!
Defining Customized Employment: Evidenced-Based Practices for Positive Outcomes

To better understand customized employment practices, researchers conducted five focus groups with 28 professionals, including national experts and people who implement customized employment for people with disabilities. The research revealed the best practices for employment specialists to follow while assisting individuals with disabilities in obtaining employment
Scoping Review of Cost Analyses of Employment Services for Individuals with Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities

When we evaluate the outcomes for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) in achieving competitive integrated employment, it is important to consider the cost-benefit of those services. Cost-benefit is an analysis of how much it costs to achieve a certain beneficial outcome. For CIE, we can calculate this in terms of how much it costs and benefits the individual worker or we can think about it in terms of the overall return on investment from the perspective of a taxpayer. The purpose of this scoping review was to analyze and synthesize the research on these cost-benefit analyses and what they tell us about different types of vocational services provided to individuals with IDD. This review looked at not only research articles, but also “grey literature” or reports, policy documents, and other ways that these cost-benefit analyses might have been published that might not have been published in a research journal. The review resulted in a total of 26 studies in addition to those other reports and documents. The main findings of the review were that services that were integrated in community businesses had the most benefit for how much they cost (from both the worker and the tax payer perspective) and lower benefits for sheltered workshops and services that segregated individuals with IDD.