Educational

Preparing Transition-Age Youth With Disabilities for Work: What School Leaders Need to Know About the New Legal Landscape - This policy brief informs school leaders about their responsibilities under recent case law to prepare youth with disabilities for work and careers. It may also be helpful to students, families, vocational rehabilitation and developmental disability agency personnel, and community rehabilitation providers.

Work-Based Learning

Improving Transition Outcomes of Youth with Disabilities by Increasing Access to Apprenticeship Opportunities | Apprenticeship Works - This issue paper was submitted to the U.S. Department of Labor on the importance of increasing access to apprenticeship opportunities for youth with disabilities.

Workforce Innovation Technical Assistance Center - This organization works with State Vocational Rehabilitation (VR) Agencies and their partners to effectively implement the requirements of the Workforce Innovation and Opportunity Act (WIOA). Learn about apprenticeships and customized trainings.

Employment & Career Growth

​​Fulfilling the Promise of Career Pathways - The Urban Institute created this brief to present three types of career advancement strategies that help people move beyond the first step on a career pathway and successfully advance in their careers.

Mentoring: Strategies to Support Expansion of Diversity in the Workforce - The Institute for Educational Leadership and HeiTech Services created this brief, which includes recommendations that focus on private, non-profit, and public sector mentoring strategies that, when implemented, promote workforce opportunities for persons with disabilities.

Barrier to Entry: Fewer Out-of-School, Out-of-Work Young Adults, As Warning Signs Emerge - Written by the Community Service Society, this report explores why there is a large decline in out-of-school and out-of-work (OSOW) young adults in New York City, who today’s OSOW young adults are, and what the challenges are for programs and policy makers moving forward.

Mentoring for Youth with Disabilities - This review examined research on mentoring for youth (ages 25 and younger) who have a disability, whether mentoring was effective, what factors condition or shape the effectiveness, what interventions are most important to linking mentoring to outcomes for youth with disabilities, and whether outcomes have been achieved.

Opportunity Youth Forum | The Aspen Institute - The Opportunity Youth Forum is comprised of a network of over two dozen urban, rural, and tribal communities seeking to scale multiple reconnection pathways that achieve better outcomes in education and employment for youth.

Blended and Braided Funding: A Guide for Policy Makers and Practitioners - This guide is intended to help officials at all levels of government put their resources to optimal use. It was prepared by a work group under the auspices of AGA’s Intergovernmental Partnership, a member organization for financial professionals in government.

Sustainability

Getting to Equal: The Disability Inclusion Advantage - New research from Accenture, in partnership with Disability:IN and the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD), reveals that companies that embrace best practices for employing and supporting more persons with disabilities in their workforce have outperformed their peers.

Leveling the Playing Field: Attracting, Engaging, and Advancing People with Disabilities - The Conference Board Research Working Group (RWG) on Improving Employment Outcomes for People with Disabilities developed this research paper of leading strategies and methods for overcoming workplace discrimination.

Ready and Able: Addressing Labor Market Needs and Building Productive Careers for People with Disabilities Through Collaborative Approaches - The National Technical Assistance and Research Center to Promote Leadership for Increasing Employment and Economic Independence of Adults with Disabilities conducted research on employer and market driven initiatives to recruit, hire, train, and retain people with disabilities.