There have been some great stories these past couple of weeks that demonstrate what people with disabilities are capable of doing in the workforce when given the opportunity, both as individuals and as a group.
I’ve been holding on to this article from the Columbia Daily Tribune while looking abroad at International Day of Persons with Disabilities celebrations and the political tussle over the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. Reporter Jodie Jackson, Jr. visited CMSE in Columbia, Missouri, an organization that provides area businesses with contract services as well as places people with disabilities in competitive employment opportunities. The occasion for the article was the organization’s successful rebound after losing a major account in 2010.
Undaunted by the setback, the individuals adapted their assembly, sorting, and packing skills to planting, potting, and nurturing duties as CMSE converted its facility into a greenhouse. While that aspect of the operation is now humming along, Jackson writes that their contract services work has picked back up to the point where productivity is up 40% over where it was a couple years ago and is almost back to the same number of employees.
Developing new job opportunities has been a common theme among many organizations that serve people with disabilities. John Latimer’s article in last Sunday’s Lebanon Daily News looks at how the Quest, Inc. organization in Pennsylvania continues its original mission of offering contract services that provide manual labor experience to its clients, while also helping people like Justin Fasnacht integrate into the community. The 21-year-old is very good with computers but his autism has contributed to some behavioral issues, writes Latimer. Since getting work at a local IT business, however, both his employer, Robert Yeagley, and Quest’s vocational placement director, Mike Barnhart, have seen Fasnacht’s mature and his true nature come to the surface:
Hiring Fasnacht has been a win-win, Yeagley said…’It has been wonderful… Even though he has autism, Justin has a lot of skills. […] He’s also a very valuable person to have in the office and fun to work with.’
The relationship worked so well that he, Fasnacht and Barnhart were asked to present information about the arrangement at a conference of vocational rehabilitation agencies in Philadelphia last summer… ‘Justin was the keynote speaker, and he had a lot of people clapping for him,’ [Yeagley] said.
Finally, there is the video of Angela Mackey found embedded in The Huffington Post column by OurAbility president, John Robinson. Angela has played a key role in the success of Walgreens initiative to increase the number of employees with disabilities in the company’s distribution centers. It’s one of the many subjects she covers very well in this five-minute video that requires no additional lead-in beyond please watch and share.
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Image by Nicolas Nova.