Robert Stensrud

Identification of the Characteristics of Work Environments and Employers Open to Hiring and Accommodating People with Disabilities

This study determined the characteristics of employers who are open to hiring and supporting people with disabilities. The purpose was to help rehabilitation professionals better target their placement and educational activities. Using a grounded theory qualitative approach, the researchers conducted focus groups and interviews with employers, employed persons with disabilities, and experienced rehabilitation placement professionals. The results indicated that 13 specific characteristics, organized into three major categories, are found among employers who are open to hiring and accommodating persons with disabilities. The three major categories were work cultural issues, job match, and employer experience and support.

Why Won't They Just Do It?

I n Greek mythology Sisyphus was a king who, after death, was condemned to roll a huge boulder up a hill only to watch it roll down again—over and over—throughout eternity. When we look at the persistently low employment rates of people with disabilities, we may often feel an uneasy kinship with Sisyphus, and our consumers may feel an uncomfortable kinship with the rock. Despite the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, and all our best efforts, people with disabilities continue to find it increasingly difficult to obtain and retain quality jobs. Burkhauser, Daly, and Houtenville (2001) found that employment rates of people with disabilities did not significantly improve, and may in fact have worsened, during the entire 1990’s business cycle. This trend has only accelerated during the first decade of the 21 century with the most recent data indicating that the employment rate of people with disabilities was 42% lower (79.7% vs. 37.7%) than those without disabilities (Rehabilitation Research and Training Center on Demographics and Statistics, 2007). Further, Houtenville, Erickson, and Lee (2005) found that the percentage of employed men and women aged 18-64 with a work limitation declined each of the first four years of the new century. Although it is true that many consumers have found employment, and there are many admirable successes within the rehabilitation service delivery system, the employment trend lines continue to head in the wrong direction, and too many placements still tend to be in the secondary labor market (Hagner, 2000). The secondary labor market includes those jobs with the lowest pay, the poorest benefits, and are the most likely to be downsized, out-sourced or laid off. They typically are filled by less-skilled workers, are closely supervised, and offer little opportunity for training or advancement.

Development and Validation of the Employer Openness Survey

This study describes the four-phase process used in developing the Employer Openness Survey (EOS). The EOS is an 18-item instrument designed to measure the openness of employers to hiring, accommodating, and promoting workers with disabilities. During the first phase, the authors generated potential questions and pilot-tested them with employers. They then evaluated scoring criteria and construct validity in the second phase. In the third phase, the EOS was field-tested with employers, scoring criteria were finalized, and interrater reliability was established. In the fourth phase, they presented the EOS to placement professionals who evaluated the clarity and usefulness of the instrument for practitioners in the field. Results of this study provide initial support for the EOS and confirmation of its usefulness for rehabilitation counselors providing placement services.

Six Degrees of Separation and Employment: Disability Services Reconsidered

A study by Milgram (1967) examined how people could establish contact with someone else at a distance without knowing the person or how to reach him or her. People mailed letters from the Midwest to the East Coast and required a median of five intervening contacts for the letters to reach their targets. Later, White (1970) re-analyzed the data and suggested that it was actually seven degrees of separation between sender and receiver. From this initial effort came a substantial amount of writing about six degrees of separation, including the game, “Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon” where people connected actors to other actors until a connection was made between that person and Kevin Bacon (http://www.thekevinbacongame.com/). Similar thinking went into the creation of Wide Area Information Networks (WAIS) such as the World Wide Web (Johnson, 2001). On the web, it is not uncommon for people to expect to find what they want within three “clicks,” or three degrees of separation, and researchers assume that the maximum number of clicks to find anything on the web is ten (Watts, 2003). If six degrees of separation is all that is needed for anyone to find anyone else, and if three clicks can find almost anything on the World Wide Web, perhaps analyzing how social networks form and connect people to each other offers a useful way to reconsider how the rehabilitation profession pursues job placement and employer development. Social network analysis offers a way to examine how rehabilitation professionals currently engage in job placement and employer development and provides empirical methodologies to demonstrate that who people know is more important than what they know. If social networks are more important than training, then our approach to rehabilitation counseling, which seeks to assist people in developing job-related skills and often keeps them out of the employment culture until they are “employment ready,” might be inappropriate. A person with a disability might be better able to find a job by following the leads of friends and family, by volunteering, or by taking jobs where he or she interacts with customers on a regular basis. Extensive use of resources of public and not-for-profit educational and employment agencies might be a disadvantage to fitting into a job which raises questions such as: What are gaps in information and/or resources that prevent people with disabilities from networking their way to jobs? and What might we do in our employer development and placement efforts that restrict their effective use of social networks? As a sociologist might say to us as rehabilitation counselors and educators: If you are not thinking social networking, then you are not thinking.

Enhanced Demand-Side Placement Model to Meet the Needs of Transition Students

Background: Over the past 25 years, research has demonstrated the value of the demand-side placement model in increasing employment opportunities for people with disabilities. Objective: The demand-side model is focused on working with businesses (the demand-side) to create systemic change within companies to pull-in consumers, in contrast to a supply side model in which we try to push clients into employment. Method: This article describes an extension of the model that is focused on establishing sector-based career pipelines between transition age youth and entry-level jobs that offer opportunities for advancement along career pathways. Findings: A number of the components of the model described in this article have been tried in various states and localities but nowhere has this model been comprehensively implemented. Conclusion: The six phases of the model are outlined with a detailed description of the activities rehabilitation counselors need to perform or facilitate the system change necessary to increase employment opportunities for transition age youth.

The Childhood to Prison Pipeline: Early Childhood Trauma as Reported by a Prison Population

This study explored the degree and type of childhood trauma experienced before the age of 18 years reported by prison inmates. The Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACE) instrument was administered to 328 incarcerated and/or recently released individuals. Participants included women, males convicted of sex offenses, and males convicted of low-risk crimes. The majority of respondents reported levels of childhood trauma substantially above that reported in the general population. Women and males convicted of sex offenses reported the highest degree of trauma. The discussion addresses how rehabilitation counselors can collaborate with others in the counseling profession for earlier identification of individuals who may be experiencing or have experienced childhood trauma and promote better trauma-informed transition services to postsecondary education and employment and reduce levels of incarceration.