Community conversations: Engaging stakeholders to improve employment-related transition services for youth with emotional and behavioral disabilities

Abstract

PURPOSE: To present the findings of World Café focused community conversations organized to identify existing and needed resources for transition age youth with disabilities.

DESIGN: A qualitative descriptive research design.

PARTICIPANTS: 52 professionals, parents, and students with disabilities with knowledge of transition services for youth with disabilities residing in a medium size city in the southern U.S.

RESULTS: The results identified five important areas of service for transition age youth with disabilities. They are (a) demand side focused vocational rehabilitation services, (b) transition services for building employment skills, (c) connecting existing community based resources, (d) advocacy services, and (e) parent and family involvement in transition.

CONCLUSION: The study demonstrated the usefulness of community conversations in encouraging participants to think critically and in generating action plans to address a social exigency. In the process this study re-established the need for further investigation of the potential of community conversations to address key challenges facing diverse populations with disabilities, their families and communities, service providers, educators, researchers, and policy makers.

Keywords

World Café community conversation secondary transition

1 Introduction

Introducing people with disabilities to the world of work and providing services to enable them to participate in the labor market continue to be priorities for policy makers (Kiernan, Hoff, Freeze, & Mank, 2011). In spite of legislative focus on employment at the Federal level, a large segment of the population with disabilities remains un- or underemployed. For example, the employment-population ratio for those with disabilities aged 16-64 years is 26.8%, compared to 64% for those without disabilities. Employees with disabilities experienced greater job loss and hardship during the recent recession than those without disabilities, which made job placement and community reintegration of the former group more challenging (Kaye, 2010; Fogg, Harrington, & McMahon, 2010; National Council on Disability [NCD], 2011). These disparities are even more pronounced among youth and young adults with disabilities within the age range of 16-24 years, especially those from historical minority backgrounds (e.g., African Americans). In most cases, youth with disabilities have the same aspirations and dreams as those without disabilities (Burchardt, 2004; LoBianco & Kleinert, 2013), but considerable gaps between their aspirations and outcomes have been repeatedly identified (Stewart et al., 2010).

The National Longitudinal Transition Survey - 2 (NLTS-2), a study of a nationally representative sample of adolescents and young adults with disabilities (ranging from ages 13 to 16 years at the beginning of the decade-long research) illustrated that many young adults with disabilities did not complete high school, enroll in postsecondary institutions, and/or obtain full-time employment with benefits. In fact, the first two waves of NLTS2 data showed that only 72% of youth across all disability categories completed high school (Wagner, Newman, Cameto, & Levine, 2005).

For young adults with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD), the results were significantly worse. Only 56% of students with EBD completed high school and of those only 85% obtained a regular high school diploma (Wagner, Newman, Cameto, Garza, & Levine, 2005). African Americans are more than twice as likely to be identified with EBD and intellectual disabilities as all other races/ethnicities combined (U.S. Department of Education & U.S. Office of Special Education and RehabilitationServices, 2011).

Additionally, transition age youth (TAY) with disabilities from low-income families are less likely to complete high school than those from high-income backgrounds (Balcazar et al., 2012; Wagner, Cameto, & Newman, 2003). Those from Hispanic background are less likely to graduate from high school than their European-American and African American counterparts. Two years after high school graduation, TAY from African American background are less likely to secure employment than Whites (Wagner, Newman, Cameto, & Levine, 2005). Youth with disabilities are half as likely as their peers without disabilities to participate in postsecondary education (Wills, 2008) and thrice as likely to be poor in adulthood as their counterparts without disabilities (Marder, Levine, Wagner, & Cardoso, 2003; National Collaboration on Workforce and Disability [NCWD], 2015). In August 2012, the employment rate for TAY with disabilities was one third that of people without disabilities (U.S. Department of Labor, 2012). Berry and Caplan (2010) and Silverstein (2010) listed experiences common among TAY with disabilities, especially those with EBD, e.g., high rate of unemployment and underemployment, economic instability, and lowlevels of participation in postsecondary education and vocational training programs.

As a direct result, a sizable proportion of TAY with disabilities depends on costly disability benefits. In 2009, 1.066 million youth received Supplemental Security Income (SSI) benefits for an annual total of $7.5 billion (Social Security Administration, 2010). During the same year, 196,000 individuals aged 25 and under received Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) benefits amounting to about $1 billion a year (Social Security Administration 2011). This figure will only increase if youth with disabilities do not transition to productive adult lives. Though many emotional and behavioral disabilities are considered to evidence needs that do not involve intensive supports (i.e., considered mild in nature), continued and lengthy experiences in which goals and benchmarks are not met can lead to reduced functioning and productivity; and these can be associated with lack of involvement and access to relevant services (Fraker et al., 2011).

Vocational, educational, and social transitions to adulthood can be challenging for many youth (with and without disabilities) due to issues related to separating from parents, developing autonomy, increasing responsibilities, and moving to adult-based service delivery systems. The importance of this transition period is immense, as the choices made in the ensuing few years can have important lifelong implications (Honeycutt & Whittenburg, 2012). However, in addition to the usual issues encountered by all TAY, those with disabilities report challenges related to health, social and environmental isolation, and lack of access to services and supports such as work-related experiences such as on-the-job training, independent living programs, and vocational rehabilitation (Silverstein, 2010). As a result, a large segment of this population experiences low educational attainment, poor employment outcomes, and a lifetime of economic dependence on government support systems.

In spite of the existence of the above mentioned hindrances and their cumulative effects on TAY with disabilities over their entire life span, there is a large knowledge gap on evidence-based techniques for assisting this group in their efforts to improve employment and earning opportunities in adulthood (Fraker et al., 2012). Recently, the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living andRehabilitation Research (NIDILRR), U.S. Department of Health and Human Services funded Project Work Opportunity through Resource and Capacity Building (WORC) to construct and validate a servicedelivery model that has the potential to enable TAY with EBD to achieve successful postschool outcomes. This project was implemented in a large southern state where transition outcomes are among the poorest in the United States (Honeycutt, Thompkins, Bardons, & Stern, 2013). As a primary step toward operationalizing the project, a series of community conversations (CCs) were held to connect and expand employment-related opportunities for the target population. The purpose of this article is to present qualitative research findings from these community conversations organized to identify existing and needed resources for transition age youth with EBD.

1.1 The World Café

The World Café is an approach to strategic dialogue, multi-stakeholder engagement, multi-generational collaboration, and cooperative action. The process builds on the virtues of traditional practices of dialogue and deliberation in an array of diverse cultures. Twenty years of international action research and experiments in Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, and North America have enabled identification of seven key World Café design principles. Investigative efforts have included disciplines such as business, health care, education, environmental protection, social welfare, conflict resolution, and sustainable development (Brown & Issacs, 2005).

Community conversations, by design, begin with a clearly articulated purpose identifying the participants, the essential questions, and the desired results. Next, the implementation of successful CCs relies on welcoming and supporting participants’ sharing of ideas through creative thinking, speaking, and listening. In order to provoke participants’ motivation and conversation, questions that are posed to the group must be compelling and relevant to their real-life concerns. Some CCs focus on a single question, whereas others broach progressively deeper issues through several rounds of conversation. Importantly, every participant is encouraged to contribute his or her ideas and perspectives and to take the time to listen to others. The tone of CCs is conversational; during robust CCs participants move between tables, meet new people, actively contribute, exchange perspectives, and link the new ideas to ever-widening circles of shared ideas. Participants work together to record their interactions (both verbal and non-verbal) graphically, capturing ideas and expressions by notating words and images using markers and large sheets of blank paper. This group-oriented visual thinking exercise underscores connection, contributes, lessons learned, and collective meaning making. The culminating step of the CC is called “the harvest,” a segment that is devoted to gleaning the ideas from individuals and groups. As ideas are shared and recorded with the larger group, participants identify themes, patterns, and insights that respond to the central question(s) or problem(s) osed. (Morrison, 2007; Carter, Swedeen, & Moss, 2012; Tubbs-Cooley, Martsolf, Pickler, Morrison, & Wardlaw, 2013).

1.2 Community conversations

Community conversations have been used as a strategy to identify and increase opportunities for adolescents and young adults with disabilities to access necessary services among collaborating individuals and community entities (Trainor, Carter, Owens, & Swedeen, 2008; Trainor, Carter, Swedeen, & Pickett, 2012). One reason this strategy works is that it brings a broad cross-section of community members together to identify specific localized solutions for addressing the need for resources and collaboration among individuals and organizations. Another benefit of CCs is that expertise from participants with a wide range of professional and life experiences is harnessed to facilitate community-based problem solving and promote sustainable changes. Diverse groups of individuals can help capture varied perspectives and ideas, identify connections to a number of different service providers, and initiate social networking that can generate meaningful partnerships (Hyde & Meyer, 2010).

2 Method

Project WORC employed CCs as a method of building upon existing partnerships among a diverse set of community entities and creating new collaborations to deliver a multipronged intervention package designed to improve the quality of transition outcomes for youth with disabilities. Following the model of the World Café, Project WORC faculty and staff organized three CCs, involving a diverse group of community members who were likely to have insight into strategies and resources for addressing these pressing community issues. The Project WORC CCs were held at a neutral location large enough to accommodate a comfortable layout for the activity. The following steps of the World Café model were implemented in each CC. Upon arrival, participants were seated at small round tables (5-6 at each table) with ample supply of colored pens and blank paper. In CC fashion, each table had a “host.” The table hosts were selected prior to the event (based on their familiarity with the focus on the event) from the list of probable participants and made aware of their responsibilities, but did not receive any training from Project WORC staff. The role of the table host was to welcome table guests; facilitate introductions; provide summary of prior conversation to facilitate building upon already shared; remind people to make note of the connections, ideas, and discoveries; remind participants to make a note of questions, links between themes, and ideas as they emerge; and take notes.

A facilitator took 10-15 minutes to welcome participants, explain the purpose of the meeting, and describe the conversation process (as discussed below). Small group discussions began at each round table with the facilitation of the researcher/leaders. After 15-20 minutes, participants dispersed and sat at different tables and continued to discuss the same question for another 15-20 minutes. After this round, participants dispersed to new tables one last time to discuss a new and more focused question. Upon completion of three rounds, each participant would have met and conversed with at least 15 others. After this round, the facilitator conducted the large-group harvest of the best ideas, resources, and strategies by opening the floor up for with the intention of creatively connecting the ideas to address the two focuses these three CCs (Focus 1 and 2 mentioned below). Harvest enables the emerging pattern of wholeness visible to the participants in a large group conversation. This approach increases participants’ active involvement and trust (Morrison, 2007; Tubbs-Cooley, Martsolf, Pickler, Morrison, & Wardlaw, 2013). The proceedings of harvest were recorded on flip charts and all participant-generated notes were collected for review by the Project WORC team.

The CCs were a part of a larger data collection process of Project WORC. The overall goal of Project WORC was to construct and validate a service delivery model that has the potential to enable TAY with EBD to achieve five guideposts that can steer families, service systems, and youth through the transition processes: (a) school-based preparatory experiences, (b) career preparation and work-based learning experiences, (c) youth development and leadership, (d) connecting activities and supports such tutoring and mentoring, and (e) family or caring adult involvement. A total of three CCs were organized to obtain detailed responses to two focus questions carefully designed to address the shared, local concern regarding poor transition outcomes. Focus 1: What can our community do to increase summer employment opportunities for TAY with EIB disabilities? Focus 2: What can I do to increase summer employment opportunities for TAY with EIB disabilities? Further, probes were used by table hosts to facilitate elaboration of participants’ responses. These included, What can our community do to better prepare TAY with disabilities for a successful life after high school? What can we do to more fully include TAY with disabilities in activities of high schools and communities (e.g., volunteer work, service learning, civic activities, and leisure opportunities)? What can we do to foster collaboration between high schools and employers?

2.1 Recruitment of participants

Project WORC was designed to involve several high schools in partnership with a single school district located in a southern state. Therefore, the series of CCs included school administrators; high school teachers, guidance counselors, exceptional student service personnel, administrators, students, and parents; and representatives from state vocational rehabilitation agency, various community rehabilitation programs, independent living centers, national disability advocacy groups, private for profit rehabilitation entities, state-wide employer coalition, and local employers; and college and university faculty and staff. Community members outside of the group of professional educators and service providers were also invited so that new perspectives, resources, ideas, and connections could be identified.

A number of strategies were used to purposefully select and recruit participants, recognizing that asking for two hours of their valuable time (any part of the day) may act as a deterrent. A one-page flyer (hard copy and electronic) was used to invite potential participants and advertise the need for high quality transition and academic support and employment-related services for youth with disabilities in the identified community. The flyer also explained the structure and duration of the CC, and the logistics of the meeting. The initial list of invitees was created by reviewing professional literature on TAY with EBD; websites of the participating school board and high schools; postsecondary institutions in the area, Chamber of Commerce, the state Departments of Health and Hospitals, Housing, and Transportation, the state Business Leadership Network, Office of Community Services, and the Mayor’s Office; and list of vendors of the state vocational rehabilitation agency. An e-mail list was prepared and appended from listserv of the entities mentioned above. The invitational flyer was e-mailed and/or faxed to individuals identified by the above process and physically posted in public places (e.g., schools, libraries, community centers, municipal buildings, restaurants, and other visible locations). Additionally, high school staff, the state vocational rehabilitation agency and their vendors, and selected employers were personally requested to widely dissemination the flyer. Social media such as Facebook were also used. Publicity for each CC was initiated about six to eight weeks prior to the activity.

Participants (N = 52) in the three CCs (N_CC1 = 17, N_CC2 = 23, N_CC3 = 12) included individuals who represented a total of 38 different institutions and agencies including school systems, colleges and universities, human service agencies (e.g., VR, community based not-for-profit entities), employers, job centers, and civic and faith based organizations. A total of 7 persons with disabilities and 4 parents of children with disabilities also attended the CCs.

2.2 Data collection

Approval of the Institutional Review Board (IRB) was obtained from the host university. Additionally, a memorandum of understanding was signed with the participating school district. During the conversations, five Project WORC researchers and graduate students assisted in facilitating the event, observed the process, took field notes on mobile devices, collected written artifacts (such as participant demographic surveys; anonymous notes on writing tabs, napkins, and tablecloths; and findings of large group discussions on flipcharts; etc.), and debriefed the events describing necessary changes for future activities. Additionally, each table host generated detailed notes about the proceedings, including obvious non-verbal interaction and summarization of verbal rounds of discussions.

2.3 Data analysis

Researchers collected participant-generated data from all three CCs, 12 sets of observational field notes (taken by four Project WORC staff during the CCs), and demographic surveys (gender, ethnicity, position held, and years of work experience) completed by 52 participants (see Table 1). About 76% of the participants were female, 56% were European Americans, 30% were allied health professionals, and 23% each had 1-5 years and 16-20 years of experience in rehabilitation related disciplines. Data analysis focused on the content of the participant generated data and demographic surveys. A generic or general inductive approach was used to analyze the qualitative data (Bernauer, Litchman, Jacobs, & Robertson, 2013; Creswell & Creswell, 2013; Lichtman, 2014; Thomas, 2006). Generic qualitative data analysis, described by Thomas (2006), is based on approaches “that primarily use detailed readings (emphasis added) of raw data to derive concepts, themes, or a model through interpretations made from the raw data by an evaluator or researcher” (p. 238). The purpose of using such an approach was to enable research findings to emerge from the frequently occurring dominant themes embedded in raw data. Accordingly, data for the current study were systematically collected, rigorously read, and inductively coded according to researchers’ interpretations of the content; relationships among codes were examined, and these relationships were represented in the form of major or dominant themes (Corbin & Strauss, 2008; Glaser & Strauss, 1967). The desired outcome of this qualitative data analysis was to identifymultiple perspectives of the lessons learned from three CCs through the lenses of the Project WORC team. This mode of knowledge generation used by Project WORC incorporates the perspectives of the (a) end users to facilitate ease of portability to real world transition settings and (b) those of investigators to ensure establishment of logical link between extant literature and research findings.

3 Results

The aim of the three CCs was to identify as many potentially viable community-generated themes as possible that address the challenges facing delivery of transition services to EIB youths with disabilities. In order to ensure the social validity of suggested themes via open discussion, a large-group sharing session was held after each CC. This session also included a show of hands expressing agreement with each of the themes (Table 2). Notable disagreement was followed by discussion aimed at clarifying or modifying the theme. Key discussion points were noted on poster paper and facilitators worked with participants to secure consensus on any changes in themes. Provision of demand side (addressing employer demand in transition service planning and delivery) focused vocational rehabilitation services (frequency or number of times the topic was mentioned = 41), transition services to build employment skills (frequency = 34), and connecting existing community based resources for seamless delivery of transition services (frequency = 25) were the most frequently identified emergent themes that the CC participants perceived as having the potential to successful high school transitions for TAY with EBD. Other themes were provision of advocacy services (frequency = 15) and parents and/or family involvement in transition service planning and delivery (frequency = 14).

4 Discussion

Three CCs successfully brought together diverse groups of community members (including persons with disabilities) and promoted actively thoughtful or engaged dialogues. World Café model activities facilitated building networks in a safe setting where participants’ ideas were treated as value added, sharing of interdisciplinary ideas, realization of a common purpose, and connecting of community resources to maximize the impact of funds allocated to generate employment and related activities (Trainor, Carter, Swedeen, & Pickett, 2012). The diversity of participants, with a wide array of professional and life experiences pertaining to TAY with disabilities, acted as catalysts to the generation of group consensus on a multiplicity of solutions focusing on relatively unexplored domains of planning and delivering community-specific services. Additionally, participants were appreciative of the professional development and certification maintenance (CEUs) opportunities provided by CCs. A summary of the identified solutions and ensuing discussion are presented below.

4.1 Through the lens of the demand side

Participants emphasized the importance of four areas of service delivery. First, TAYs with EBD must be referred to vocational rehabilitation during late middle school or early high school (in the host state, transition services start with high school juniors aged 16+). Exposure to vocational rehabilitation during the early teen years may reduce drop out and promote greater goal attainment in high school. Second, involvement of community-based employers in transition planning can facilitate student engagement in pre-work experiences (such as voluntary work, job shadowing, field trips, etc. that are predictors of quality of future employment) that may potentially lead to positive employment outcomes. Third, the use of customized employment to promote coordination between available pre-adult and adult services can help ensure relatively seamless transition support. Fourth, development of employer awareness of modes of addressing the unique needs of persons with disabilities has the potential to increase collaboration that is beneficial for both the businesses and the employee. For example, taking advantage of the financial benefits of hiring persons with disabilities; and building new collaborations or extending an existing partnership with vocational rehabilitation or related human resource development entities that can facilitate hiring and retention.

4.2 Through the lens of building employment skills

Participants mentioned the importance of two areas of service delivery. First, introducing school-based vocational classes (face-to-face, weekend, after school, or online) may promote optimal use of existing scarce resources throughout a specific school district. Each school may identify an area of focus for vocational classes based on student demands and labor market trends, e.g., science, engineering, culinary arts, graphic design, etc. These classes can be team taught in collaboration with professionals in the community and postsecondary education faculty or advanced graduate students. Second, offering career awareness and self-actualization, job seeking skills, time management, money management, soft skills, social skills, and study skills development sessions as part of the high school curriculum likely prepares students to address challenges of postsecondary education and future employment.

4.3 Through the lens of connecting existing community-based resources

There is a need for transforming schools into centers for building critical partnerships among special education, vocational rehabilitation, health services, enrichment opportunities, leisure and recreation, mentors and tutors, employment services, institutions of higher education, and related federal programs. Provision of on-going mentoring and guidance was recommended to help develop self-determination skills such as self-awareness, assertiveness, creativity, pride, problem solving, decision making, self-advocacy, self-efficacy, social interaction, and independent living.

4.4 Limitations

This study had two limitations that are important to note. The participation of parents and TAY was low compared to the service provider and employer groups. The lack of representation of parents and TAY may have reduced the social validity of the findings. Also, the overall sample size of the three CCs was small and may have affected the depth of information generated.

4.5 Conclusion

The value of CCs is judged from their ability to create social spaces for dialogue to enable marginalized populations to engage in critical thinking that may lead to identification of strategies for change (Campbell et al., 2013). Conversations can be vital condition for reflecting on the possibility implementing interventions but many other factors mediate the link between such reflection and concrete behavior change. These CCs cannot mitigate the effects of contextual constraints such as funding, public awareness/attitude, political agenda, legislative and policy issues, etc. Additionally, the authors do not make claims about the possibility of implementation of strategies for change identified by CCs because of the small scale of the study and voluntary nature of participant selection (i.e., those who participated had most at stake and to share). Subsequent research in this area should explore how to actualize the suggestions that result from these integrated community conversations that represent diverse input from multiple groups of key stakeholders.

Despite its limitations, this study generates important initial findings of a process whose potential has yet to be realized by human services fields. The authors are confident that the CCs were successful in their modest aims of presenting a detailed account of and reporting findings of CCs organized in the area of TAYs with disabilities following the World Café method. The participants have assisted in the creation of spaces needed to “break the silence”, think critically about hindrances to success for TAYs, and brainstorm to generate action plans. Additionally, this study re-established the need for further investigation of the potential CCs to contribute to addressing key challenges facing diverse populations with disabilities, their families and communities, service providers, educators, researchers, and policy makers.

Conflict of interest

The authors have no conflict of interest to declare.

Footnotes

Acknowledgments

Funding for this study was supported in part by a National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research (NIDILRR) field-initiated research grant (PR# H133G130301) to Southern University, Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

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