Abstract
School-based microenterprises and vocational training opportunities represent an effective approach to developing transferable vocational skills in students with intellectual and developmental disabilities. The authors describe the implementation of an online, school-based microenterprise at a rural high school that emphasizes functional digital literacy and uses an integrated system of visual supports to increase the autonomy of students with intellectual and developmental disabilities in a workplace setting.
Keywords
Julio, the student manager of The Café, arrives at school and immediately goes to his first class. He retrieves his timecard, clocks in, glances at his visual schedule that shows his shift assignment, then retrieves the keys to open The Café. Having dressed in his work uniform, put on his name badge, and washed his hands, Julio enters The Café to begin work. While supervising the baristas as they prepare their work stations, Julio independently uses an iPad to log into The Café email for customer orders. Julio selects the first order and reviews its details.
To successfully respond to the challenges associated with transitioning a student with an intellectual disability (ID) into employment, secondary schools must devise and implement an effective school-to-work curriculum that provides vocational skill instruction (Carter, Trainor, Cakiroglu, Swedeen, & Owens, 2010) and that seeks to engage the employment opportunities available within the local community (Brooke, Revell, & Wehman, 2009). Hart, Barnett, and Crippen (2014) suggest that an appropriate transition curriculum for students with ID should incorporate real-world, community-based vocational training experiences. However, in smaller communities, teachers may face a dearth of community-based vocational training placements, and in many rural areas accessibility is complicated by insufficient or nonexistent public transportation (Collet-Klingenberg & Kolb, 2011). One way for special educators to supplement community-based vocational training is to develop school-based enterprises that teach transferable vocational skills relevant to the local community. Research suggests that students with ID who participate in a cooperative program (i.e., one that stresses academics and vocational skills) have a greater chance of becoming securely employed after high school (Shandra & Hogan, 2008). Furthermore, Ross suggests (as cited in Carter et al., 2010) a logistical benefit of establishing a school-based enterprise is eliminating the need to transport students within the community, therefore, leaving more time for school-based vocational and academic instruction.
In this article, implementing The Café, an online, school-based microenterprise at a rural high school, is described. This innovative approach to build independent vocational skills for students with ID uses customized functional digital literacy and an integrated visual supports system to increase student autonomy.
Designing an Online, School-Based Microenterprise
With both the desire to target functional digital literacy skills and to implement an online business model, Mr. Wood developed The Café’s website using the school district’s existing WordPress.org account as an initial contact between The Café’s customers and the students with ID operating The Café. Mr. Wood included five easily navigable pages: a Home page, a Comments/Suggestions page, a Menu page, an Order page, and a Special Offers page for use by school staff and teachers (see Table 1). Mr. Wood embedded electronic forms within the website that are linked to a school district email account set up to receive electronic submissions and to be the primary interface by the students to view and receive orders.
The Café Webpage Descriptions.
Online enterprises remain a largely unexplored area with regard to developing vocational opportunities for students with ID. In a 21st century economy where, increasingly, companies are using online platforms to do business, it is important for teachers to consider ways in which they can develop capacities that make this vocational sector available to their students. Given the changing economy, it is essential to ensure that students with ID receive instruction in functional digital literacy skills such as using email, social media, and cloud-based services (Cihak, Wright, McMahon, Smith, & Kraiss, 2015). While developing an Internet-based business may seem intimidating, teachers can access various ease-of-use, web-based tools (e.g., Weebly.com, Wix.com) for this purpose. Acquiring independence in functional digital literacy skills can potentially lead to postschool employment opportunities for students with ID (Cihak et al., 2015).
The Café’s website allows students to correspond with customers to clarify orders and view submitted comments or suggestions. Electronic correspondence is an important, embedded vocational skill that allows for autonomous operation of The Café via practical, transferable functional digital literacy skills. The Café’s online platform is similar to many contemporary retail and food service businesses (e.g., Pizza Hut, Staples) that offer websites for customer use. The Café’s website serves as the nexus of a larger integrated visual system of supports designed to reduce students’ prompt dependency and to increase self-determination and self-management in a vocational setting.
Integrated Visual Supports System
Recognizing that modern jobs require diverse interpersonal and self-management skills, Mr. Wood designed an integrated visual support system to assist his students with ID in running all aspects of The Café (see Table 2). Mr. Woods used Adobe Photoshop® and the Microsoft Office Suite® to create visuals that support task initiation, task completion, and self-management.
List of Supports and Specific Functions.
Note. Table 2 lists all visual supports within The Café’s system of supports to demonstrate scope. Only a selection of visuals are discussed and displayed within this article.
Visual activity schedules represent one method of assisting students with ID with vocational tasks, by reducing their need for adult supervision. Carson, Gast, and Ayres (2008) used a visual activity schedule displayed in a small photo album to assist students with disabilities in completing vocational tasks at Walmart stores. The researchers found that the students completed tasks more efficiently and independently when using the visual activity schedules. A particularly relevant finding was that the managers of the Walmart stores found the visual activity schedules to be appropriate for the workplace, reporting that they would be an “easy strategy to implement” for employees (Carson et al., 2008, p. 277). This positive view by the managers provides real-world support for use of visual supports in the workplace and suggests that visual supports represent a viable tool for teaching transferable vocational skills.
Students with ID can be taught to run all aspects of a microenterprise through gesture, verbal, and model prompting using a system of least prompts, with an emphasis on first prompting students to use visual supports to complete tasks on their own. As students become more proficient at the various business operations and use the integrated visual system of supports independently, teacher instruction should be systematically faded and the transfer of control of The Café to the student workers initiated. Student workers in The Café are monitored by the teacher to ensure continued proficiency and to monitor growth; however, student workers should ultimately assume all responsibility for operating The Café.
Heather enters The Café for her barista work shift. She checks the posted Job Duty Schedule for her work station assigned by the shift manager. Heather notes that she is working as the server and helps her coworker make coffee and start the tea kettle. Once Heather’s station is ready, she goes to Julio for instruction on what to do next and is directed to prepare standing orders. She consults the Standing Order Board to determine what to make first.
Task Initiation Supports
Visual supports aimed at task initiation trigger the students’ starting activities needed for The Café to run productively and efficiently. Visual supports identify shift assignments (first shift or second shift) and prompt initiating relevant tasks. Student baristas are taught to identify their café duties by reviewing café visuals, reducing the need for dependency on teacher prompting for initiating assigned tasks. Tasks can be divided into two categories, job and clean-up duties (see Figure 1). Job duties rotate and can include providing direct customer service at The Café’s service counter, preparing drink orders and making deliveries in the school, operating the cash register, preparing bagel orders, and completing a weekly inventory. Clean-up duties also rotate and can include cleaning coffee makers, emptying the kettle, wiping surfaces, cleaning the bagel station, and mopping. The use of task initiation visual supports can result in eliminating teacher prompts needed for students to start work tasks.
Task initiation visual support for work station assignments.
Julio asks Alice to complete Mr. Ty’s food and drink order, placed through the website. Alice retrieves a clipboard holding a Visual Order Taker and Order Tabulation Sheet and goes to the Staff Id Board where she locates Mr. Ty’s Id Label. Alice affixes Mr. Ty’s Staff Id Label to the order taker and uses an erasable marker to record Mr. Ty’s order as Julio reads it to her. Alice asks Mark, who is assigned to the bagel station, to make Mr. Ty’s food while she makes his coffee. Seeing that Mark is struggling with making the bagel, Julio points to the posted Visual Activity Schedule for making bagels and prompts his coworker to use it for assistance.
Task Completion Supports
To address memory-associated difficulties of students with ID, a customized, sequential series of interactive visual supports can be created that allows the students to quickly record orders and provides a visual reminder of to whom and where the order is to be delivered (see Figure 2). The Café’s supports use two interactive forms: (a) a Visual Order Taker and (b) a Visual Tabulation Sheet. Each form is laminated and can be quickly and easily completed using an erasable marker, and Staff Id Labels are easily transferred to these forms using Velcro™. Students who learn to use these supports no longer require follow-up instruction from their shift manager and can take and complete orders independently.
Visual support integration diagram of order recording and purchase history.
In addition to the order fulfillment visual supports, visual activity schedules of individual café tasks provide step-by-step instructions and can be used to aid student learning and remembering of steps associated with a chained skill (e.g., making a pot of coffee; see Figure 3). These visual activity schedules are posted near where the work task is completed and are made using color photographs paired with written instructions to assist students completing the tasks. When students cannot complete a chained skill, they are prompted by special education staff or their coworkers to attend to the visual depicting the activity. Implementing task completion visual supports allows student workers in The Café to demonstrate increased independence in completing complex tasks. Students often self-fade the use of these visual systems due to their work competencies exceeding the need for supports.
Task completion visual support for making regular coffee.
Before exiting The Café to deliver an order, Delores briefly practices by reading the Customer Service Script on The Café’s wall. Delores enters Ms. Lo’s classroom to deliver coffee, saying “Good Morning, here’s your order from The Café.” Ms. Lo replies, “Thank you!” Delores responds, “You’re welcome, may I please punch your coffee card?” Delores uses a one-hole punch to punch Ms. Lo’s prepaid card. On returning to The Café, Delores uses an erasable marker to record Ms. Lo’s purchase on the Pre-Paid Card Tracker next to Ms. Lo’s affixed Staff Id Label. Delores also tracks Ms. Lo’s purchase on the Standing Order Board.
Visual Reminders
Visual supports within this category can emphasize work incentives, safety and work standards, café pricing information, and customer purchase history. Students can view these supports to help them recall workplace expectations and to assist them in providing quality service to customers. Prepaid snack and/or prepaid coffee cards, good for discounted food and drink purchases (see Figure 2), can be punched by the barista on completing each delivery. When baristas make deliveries to customers who have prepaid cards, they can interact with the customer using a practiced dialogue that emphasizes brevity and courteous customer interaction. This dialogue can be posted on the wall of The Café in the form of a color-coded Customer Service Script and used to practice the customer service dialogue prior to customer interaction (see Figure 4). Visually scripting communicative exchanges has been shown to be an effective approach to developing the communication skills of students across disability categories to address a variety of verbal communication deficits (Ganz, 2007). Variations of the Customer Service Script should be posted throughout The Café to support multiple scenarios, including a script for interacting with customers who place orders at the service counter.
Customer service script for use with customers owning a prepaid coffee card.
On returning from making a delivery, café baristas are also required to track the purchase history of customers who have prepaid cards. This is done using the café’s Prepaid Card Tracker (see Figure 2). This visual support requires the students to use an erasable marker to track deliveries completed, and serves as a visual reminder of customers’ remaining prepaid orders. When customers are close to filling their prepaid cards, the café baristas recognize the need to sell the customer another card, generating more capital for the business.
To address students spilling beverages, carelessness with equipment and supplies, and unsanitary work practices, a list of workplace Health and Safety Rules is developed and taught to the students. These rules are posted within The Café as a constant reminder of daily work performance expectations. Furthermore, workplace incentives are designed to motivate students toward safe, sanitary, and productive work practices. These earned incentives are designed specifically to encourage positive workplace behaviors. Café workers are incentivized for individual work performance and for the work performance of the entire café staff.
Students who work safely, efficiently, and correctly, and show consistent effort and initiative are eligible for the Employee of the Week award. Employees of the Week have their photo posted on the Employee of the Week Display and receive an incentive item from the program’s student store. The Employee of the Week Display is a reminder that working responsibly and diligently carries with it the potential for recognition and reward.
A Safe Work Day Count Display is posted within the café and is used to track the number of days The Café completes both work shifts without a lost time accident. Café managers update this count at the end of second shift each school day. Sixty days without a lost time accident results in a pizza lunch for all café staff. The Safe Work Day Count Display provides a reminder that working safely carries with it the potential for recognition and reward. These embedded initiatives replicate incentive initiatives often found in community-based workplaces and facilitate student understanding of such programs and their benefits. The development of these safety initiatives is also essential to passing inspection by the local health department.
Final Thoughts
Since the development and implementation of The Café 2 years ago, all operations of the microenterprise were successfully turned over to the students. Daily, student workers learn and practice a multitude of transferable vocational skills and practical, functional digital literacy skills. The autonomy with which the student workers run The Café provides support for students with ID to operate successfully a microenterprise/sole-proprietorship when provided with needed visuals. Furthermore, The Café establishes that integrating a variety of visual supports, digital or printed, into a customized system of supports, can assist students with ID completing a variety of complex, interconnected vocational tasks. While the use of this visual system of supports is described for a food service job, designing and implementing a comprehensive integrated visual system in other school-based microenterprises and in community-based workplaces may offer expansive opportunity for individuals with ID. It may also represent a cost-effective approach to supported employment, reducing the need for direct instruction and prompting from job coaches. Students with ID who are equipped with a broad set of transferable job skills developed within The Café may successfully transition to competitive work.
Footnotes
Acknowledgements
The authors would like to acknowledge Jamie Gustafson who provided the initial inspiration for this work.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.