In case you missed it, Wednesday’s edition of The Boston Globe contained an op-ed calling for greater collaboration among employers, foundations, and the public sector to bring more employment opportunities and career training for people with disabilities in Massachusetts.
“A template for job training programs for people with disabilities” was co-authored by the leaders of two of the three types of organizations in that equation: Massachusetts secretary of Labor and Workforce Development, Joanne F. Goldstein; and Ruderman Family Foundation president, Jay Ruderman. With unemployment numbers among individuals with disabilities still well above the national average, each person is clearly seeking more employers to forward their programs.
The section most likely written by Goldstein talks about the progress Massachusetts’ state government has made under Governor Deval Patrick’s, whose effort to increase workforce participation by people with disabilities mirrors President Obama’s executive order to add 100,000 employees with disabilities in federal agencies by 2015. She writes:
Governor Patrick’s Strategic Plan to Make Massachusetts a Model Employer for People with Disabilities provides a set of recommendations for affirmatively promoting the hiring and retention of people with disabilities in the executive branch of state government. Since the effort commenced in 2007, the percentage of persons with a disability employed in the executive branch increased by approximately 70 percent.
As we’ve noted previously, Jay Ruderman is a fiery advocate for creating job opportunities for people with disabilities. The Transitions to Work program his family’s foundation operates at the Hebrew Senior LIfe’s Newbridge on the Charles is providing job-specific training for individuals with disabilities and matching them with available positions. He adds correctly that the programs also make life matter more for these individuals by instilling self-esteem in them.
Curiously, the op-ed doesn’t mention the fact that Massachusetts was recently awarded a $4.8 million federal grant for taking part in the Labor Department’s Disability Employment Initiative. Our article about it notes the program’s very purpose is to support extensive collaboration across multiple workforce and disability service systems.
Transitions to Work, like American Training and other organizations in the state with a similar mission, will no doubt be linchpins in providing workers with disabilities with the training and opportunity to prove they can be productive employees, whether its performing light assembly, sorting, packaging, and other fulfillment tasks, clerical work and administrative support, janitorial or housekeeping duties, or even supervisory and management positions. All these individuals need is an employer to give them a chance to do the work they are qualified to do.
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