Serendipity35

In the Great Depression, national unemployment was estimated at about twenty-five percent of the total available workforce. In the 21st century the employment rate of disabled adult Americans is estimated at about twenty-six percent.

But, now, there is a work training program that aims to achieve an employment rate of 100% for that same adult-disabled population.

Funded by a grant from the Kessler Foundation, NJIT's Continuing Professional Education began the two year EmployMe! program in May of 2007 by enrolling 15 students in an 18 week employment training program that began with five weeks of employment soft-skills training and continued in two specialized tracks to web-based technologies and computer system administration. Over 120 students are expected to complete the entire program and join the workforce by the Spring of 2009.

In addition to the daily job-skills classroom training, students participate in weekly seminars and discussions hosted by NJIT's Career Development Services and the Business Advisory Council. Using these professional resources, students are exposed to real-world employment opportunities and working environments. Paid internships in businesses and professional organizations are available to graduating students as a way to transition into (or back into) the workplace.

Its a funny thing about people with disabilities --they are just like everyone else. Anyone who is told over and over that their personal limitations are too great to overcome might begin to believe that story. And the candidates who applied to this program in early 2007 had to participate in basic computer assessments, and personal interviews at a university facility --a daunting task for anyone who had been convinced that they didn't belong in a mainstream environment --and many were initially intimidated by those surroundings. But the main criteria for admittance into this program were: the desire to become employable, and the fundamental belief that personal limitations could be overcome. Aided by the most basic of adaptive technologies --adequate mobile space for those in wheelchairs, computer monitor magnifying or screen reading programs for the visually impaired, interpreters for those with absent or reduced verbal communication skills-- the students began their studies.

On September 6th, 2007, the EmployMe! program will graduate its first class. The students who were first enrolled in the program as adults with limiting disabilities will graduate as adults with enhanced abilities. They will have the ability to perform jobs in the many fields of web-based technologies; they will have the ability to perform jobs in Unix system administration they will have the set of skills required to become a functional, effective and valued employee. And, most importantly, they will know that they have the ability to overcome the limitations that other people have set for them in the past and may also set for them in the future.