AFB’s New Employment Strategy
by Karen WOLFFE
The purpose of this paper is to introduce and describe the latest developments in the American Foundation for
the Blind (AFB) Employment Program. The most obvious change in the AFB Employment Program is the recent designation
of AFB's former western regional office in San Francisco, CA, as the National Employment Center (NEC).
The NEC is both a physical and virtual repository for storing and sharing information on best practices
in the placement of job candidates with visual disabilities, marketing materials for employers, and statistical
data on the employment status of blind and visually impaired people. With private foundation support, the NEC has
been able to double the number of AFB staff committed to working on employment-related issues. By encompassing
and expanding the present work of the AFB employment team, NEC personnel intend to positively impact the employment
rates of Americans with visual disabilities.
Employment rates for people with visual disabilities in the United States continue to hover between 30% and 40%, when people without disabilities are employed at rates over 80% (Kirchner, Schmeidler, Todorov, 1999). There are four major efforts underway at AFB to address these unacceptable employment rates:
Career information sharing and mentoring for job seekers with visual disabilities and those who help them with their job searches via an enhanced Internet presence.
Ensuring that there is a supply of qualified trainers of assistive technology with a certifiable set of competencies in the skills and tools used by blind and low vision job seekers.
Developing informative tools for prospective employers about the abilities of visually impaired job candidates for recruitment purposes and strategies for retaining adventitiously impaired workers.
Teaching current and prospective rehabilitation counselors and related service providers how to work effectively with blind and visually impaired youths and adults.
The two significant areas at AFB in which I am intimately involved, the enhanced Internet site for job seekers and those who help them in their job searches (parents, teachers, and rehabilitation practitioners) and the university-based distance education course for rehabilitation practitioners on how to work effectively with blind and visually impaired youths and adults in the job placement process, make up the core content of this paper. However, I share handouts and materials from the other AFB employment projects as well and encourage you to let me know if you would like additional information. In fact, if you would like further details about any of the handouts or additional information about the projects I describe, please feel free to contact me directly via e-mail:
wolffe@afb.net.
Last year, AFB added to its Internet presence with a section devoted to career development, which we call AFB CareerConnect™. CareerConnect is an interactive website that introduces job seekers to a variety of tools that they can use to explore careers, locate and make contact with potential mentors who are visually impaired performing in jobs like the ones they are considering, learn about job seeking techniques used successfully by individuals with visual disabilities, and easily find related resources – links to other sites, reading materials, and local rehabilitation or education facilities. The AFB CareerConnect website is fully accessible and has a wealth of information about both general careers and careers being performed by blind and visually impaired workers – the prospective mentors. The site is dynamic and therefore content is frequently added.
If an individual does not have easy access to the Internet, he or she can still learn about jobs being performed in the United States and Canada by adults with visual impairments and identify prospective mentors using either the CareerConnect CD-ROM, which is available upon request, or by calling or writing to AFB staff at AFB’s newest office: AFB TECH (the Technology and Employment Center at Huntington, WV). AFB TECH is staffed with people devoted to evaluating assistive technology and viable mainstream technology for people with visual disabilities; as well as providing support for individuals in the career exploration process. In the technology unit, personnel evaluate tools that can make employment a reality – from cell phones to braille printers.
The CD-ROM lists all the CareerConnect mentors and their jobs without identifying personal information. A unique identification number identifies each CareerConnect member in the database. Any interested individual can search the database on the CD-ROM, note one or any number of CareerConnect member identification numbers that match his or her criteria (interest areas, geographical locations, visual status, and so forth) and then contact a CareerConnect staff person for information on how to reach prospective members by telephone, post, or E-mail, the CareerConnect members selected.
The AFB CareerConnect materials are free-of-charge, easy-to-access, easy-to-understand resources that students or adults with visual disabilities and those who work with them can use to learn about specific jobs as well as the range and diversity of jobs that are performed throughout the United States and Canada. These materials were developed in response to a need expressed by students and adults who wanted accessible information about the labor market and an opportunity to connect with prospective mentors with visual impairments who were performing in the types of jobs that they were interested in pursuing. At the core of these materials is a database of people with visual impairments working at a variety of jobs.
The CareerConnect database lists well over 1,000 blind or visually impaired people who work
in more than 300 different jobs. Although the majority of the jobs in the database are professional-level
jobs, which require college training, there are efforts underway to expand the database to include more jobs
that do not require postsecondary training. Examples of the jobs represented in the database include assistive
technology trainer, astronomer, attorney, call center operator, chemist, cleric, college professor, computer analyst,
computer programmer, court reporter, electrical engineer, elementary school teacher, high school teacher, farmer, food
service worker, homeopathic medicine practitioner, investment broker, journalist, marketing professional, mechanic,
medical transcriptionist, musician, nurse, physical therapist, physicist, psychologist, radio personality, television
personality, real estate professional, rehabilitation counselor, restaurant owner, social worker, statistician, and
website designer. The database includes workers with different kinds of visual impairments.
The CareerConnect site is housed on the main AFB website (
www.afb.org)
or can be reached directly at
www.afb.org/careerconnect.
The site is accessible to low vision and blind users as well as fully sighted individuals.
When individuals visit the CareerConnect site, they are given a choice regarding the size and style
of fonts and color scheme they prefer for viewing the site information. Following a brief description of what
CareerConnect is, visitors are asked if they would like to access an overview of the site before getting started.
The overview simply explains what information is available on the site and very briefly defines the content areas.
From the main page, visitors can link directly to any of the content areas
(Careers, Mentors, Tips, My CareerConnect, Technology, and Resources), which appear underscored as choices
across the top of the screen. Brief descriptions of these content areas follow.
Careers
When visitors first enter the Careers section, they are encouraged to read Tips for Career
Exploration where they can learn techniques for analyzing themselves to determine what they have to offer
employers. Tips for Career Exploration describes how to compose a self-analysis profile
(in which the job seekers identify interests, abilities, values, and liabilities) off-line to use as
they search for a career direction and jobs in the future. They can find general information about jobs that
are available in the United States labor market. This information is from the U.S. Department of Labor
and is not specific to job seekers with visual impairments; rather, it is general information about representative
jobs in the United States. They can search for information about these general jobs by browsing occupational categories,
by searching for jobs in their interest areas, or by entering specific job titles or keywords.
Mentors
Mentors are the blind or visually impaired workers who are willing to discuss their jobs with site visitors.
The mentors' insights as to how they perform in their jobs without good vision and what tools they use to enable
them to work competitively may help other job seekers with visual disabilities determine whether jobs they are
considering are viable. Before contacting mentors, visitors can review a list of questions they might want to
consider asking a prospective mentor in Tips on Contacting a Mentor. Visitors can search for a mentor by job title,
field of employment, city, state, ID number, or up to three job tasks. Once they have found a mentor in
the database with whom they would like to connect, they can E-mail the mentor directly from the site.
Under this tab and on the home page, visitors are asked if they would like to become mentors. If they are already
mentors, they can login from here as well as from the home page.
Tips
The Tips section includes information in three major categories: Finding a Job, Getting Hired, and Keeping a Job.
Under Finding a Job, job seekers can read about exploring possible careers (this chunk of content is repeated from
the Careers section), organizing their workspace, managing their time, and finding job leads. Under Getting Hired, job
seekers can read about deciding when to disclose information about their disabilities, what personal data sheets and
résumés are and how to use them, how to negotiate assistance during a job search, and how to interview
successfully. Under Keeping the Job, they can read about what an employer considers to be a perfect worker,
what employer expectations are and how they change over time, and learn some basic communication dos and don’ts.
The Tips section is an evolving section where content is added and/or modified on a fairly frequent basis.
My CareerConnect
My CareerConnect is an interactive section, which includes a number of tools that job seekers
can use in their career exploration and ultimately, in job searches. The choices in this section are: Create/Edit
My Profile, where a job seeker can input and store the information to be included on his or her personal data sheet
or résumé; the Personal Data Sheet, which is generated from the information entered in the profile and
can be printed out to use if and when someone (a scribe) helps a visually impaired job seeker fill out print applications
that are otherwise inaccessible; the Résumé Builder, which also uses the information entered in the
profile to produce a printable résumé; My Calendar, with which job seekers can keep up with pending
appointments and deadlines in an electronic format; and My Messages, an option where they can find and store any
E-mail communication to and from prospective mentors.
Technology
The Technology section describes the importance of technology in the lives of workers with visual impairments.
In this section visitors can read about screen magnification systems, braille technology, synthetic speech systems,
optical character recognition, and video magnifiers; as well as, find out what such products cost.
Visitors can also find contact information for vendors of assistive technology products or link from
the CareerConnect site directly to vendor sites for more information.
Resources
In the Resources section, visitors can learn a little about the services, materials, and tools available both
commercially from private vendors and without expense through federal and state or provincial government entities.
These services, materials, and tools may assist job seekers in career exploration or during their job searches.
They can find information on Internet sites under Useful Links, a listing of organizations in the United
States and Canada that provide career counseling and job placement for people with visual impairments under Job Training,
a list of related book titles under Recommended Reading, and a list of books by and about blind and visually
impaired people under Biographies and Autobiographies.
Home
The final tab is Home, which takes visitors back to the CareerConnect Home Page where they have the option to read
the overview or go to any of the content choices just discussed: Careers, Mentors, Tips, My CareerConnect, Technology,
or Resources. Home is where visitors who are blind or visually impaired workers are asked if they would like to
become mentors. If visitors are already mentors (individuals who participated as mentors in the previous database
effort known as the Careers and Technology Information Bank – CTIB – or individuals who have joined the new CareerConnect
mentor database), they can login from the CareerConnect home page.
The Home Page
The Home Page is also where new and noteworthy information is posted. For example, at present it is on the home page where a recent
interview with Erik Weihenmayer, the well-known blind mountaineer and a CareerConnect mentor is posted. Erik talks about the importance of having and being a mentor. In addition, on the home page there are listings for a number of guides (one each for rehabilitation practitioners, teachers, parents, students and adults with visual disabilities) that describe how to use the site and provide related activities for exploring careers and job hunting. Finally, also listed on the home page is an archival copy of a web cast that was produced for rehabilitation practitioners to orient them to the CareerConnect site.
One, additional and interesting note: We are currently collaborating with a group known as Art Education for the Blind (AEB). AFB is creating a web site for AEB called
Art Beyond Sight. We intend to add AEB participants into the CareerConnect mentor database, and links are being developed that will go between the two sites with information benefiting both parties. The National Endowment for the Arts is providing paid internships for art museums to hire disabled interns and a few museums (the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York and the Chicago Museum of Contemporary Art, for example) have expressed a specific interest in hiring blind interns. We plan to have features detailing their experiences on the CareerConnect site.
Finding well-trained rehabilitation counselors who understand the unique needs of blind and visually impaired people and who can cultivate appropriate job opportunities for them is difficult. Historically, one-size-fits-all professional training programs have produced counselors who are not equipped to meet the needs of blind and visually impaired clients. One well-trained counselor can place or help to place 15 to 25 people with visual disabilities a year. At AFB, we have targeted improving the job placement knowledge, skills and networking capabilities of rehabilitation counselors in an effort to increase their success rate when assisting blind and low vision job seekers looking for suitable employment.
To that end, AFB and the University of Arkansas at Little Rock (UALR) have joined staff and financial resources to provide a master's level distance education course, which addresses the unique needs of rehabilitation clients (sometimes referred to as consumers) with visual disabilities. This online course,
Placement Techniques in the 21st Century for People with Visual Disabilities, provides students with specific job placement techniques that rehabilitation counselors can use to successfully facilitate the job search process for blind and low vision rehabilitation clients. The course includes content for working with consumers of varying abilities – those who need minimal assistance to those who need extensive intervention, including consumers with multiple disabilities.
The course is offered each spring semester and only via the Internet. It is a 15-week course based on a series of workshops that received the 2000 Rehabilitation Services Administration Commissioner's Award for Excellence in Rehabilitation Education and Training. The course may be taken for credit toward licensure or a master's degree credential. For complete information on this course and the other courses being offered through UALR’s online rehabilitation counselor education program, visit their website
www.teletrain.com/ualr.
I am teaching the Placement Techniques course and I cover disability-specific content in all areas of career counseling:
Self awareness, vocational exploration, job seeking, job maintenance, and job search.
I also address school-to-work transition issues, working with clients who have additional disabilities
(in particular clients with vision and hearing impairments), assistive technology, self-employment options, working
successfully with employers, and provide extensive information on resources relevant to the placement of individuals
with visual disabilities. I am joined in this online teaching effort by my colleagues, Gil Johnson, from AFB;
John Maxson, from Mississippi State University; and Chuck Young, the former Executive Director of the Oregon
Commission for the Blind; who act as guest lecturers. All of our lectures are video streamed and the full transcripts
are available to deaf or hard-of-hearing students who need them. We use Power Point slides and these are made
available, in advance, to students with visual disabilities or other reading difficulties in text files so that
they can follow along with the instructor as the fully sighted students follow the slides. In addition to the
video streamed lectures, students complete homework on a weekly basis that necessitates that they apply what they
have learned, participate in threaded discussions (I don’t use chat rooms because I haven’t found a way to make them
accessible!), write a series of short reports on journal articles or chapters, complete a community-based labor market
project, and, of course, match wits with the instructor on midterm and final examinations.
Although huge numbers of students have not participated to date (the course has only been offered twice), those who have come through the training have been positive in their end-of-term feedback. Three students with sensory disabilities – two with visual disabilities and one with a combined vision and hearing disability – and one student with a chronic health impairment have participated in the course. The students with disabilities have been able to complete the course with minimal modifications and their comments on the threaded discussions have been well received by the students without disabilities.
The AFB National Employment Center's mission is to address the unacceptably high unemployment rate of qualified blind
and visually impaired job seekers by understanding and meeting the needs of three constituencies: employers;
job seekers and current workers who are blind or visually impaired; and the rehabilitation professionals who serve
them. In addition to the two projects that I have described in detail, my colleagues at AFB have been working
diligently on defining competencies needed by assistive technology trainers in an effort to curb the severe shortage
of trainers knowledgeable in this area. A list of the proposed competencies is posted on the AFB website for your
reading pleasure. We are also developing materials specifically addressing employers’ needs. I have with me an example,
Are You Looking for a Few Good Workers? (AFB, 2000). This packet, which includes a flyer and a small pocket
folder with six informative inserts, is a recruitment tool that professionals and job seekers with visual disabilities
can use to help employers understand the capabilities of blind and visually impaired workers. This information
is also available on the AFB website, both visually and in files that are formatted for braille production and
can be downloaded. This public relations tool, the work with assistive technology trainers, the UALR distance
education course, and AFB CareerConnect™ are all tools in the new AFB Employment Program toolbox – please
feel free to use them and to give us feedback on how to make them better. We look forward to working with you to
improve employment opportunities for people with visual disabilities throughout the world.
References
American Foundation for the Blind (2000) Are you looking for a few good workers ? New York: author.
Kirchner, C., Schmeidler, E., Todorov, A. (1999). Looking at employment through a lifespan telescope. New York: American Foundation for the Blind.
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