This website is an extremely helpful resource that has the ability to benefit a versatile group of people and professionals. This resource page helps to improve post-secondary outcomes for all students with disabilities and the family members and professionals that work hard to help these individuals. This website provides a ton of informative data and information, as well as other resources and links that could be of great use for individuals in the transition process, their family members, and the professionals who are dedicated to creating a positive future for these individuals. This website lists and discusses effective practices and predictors, transition planning, graduation, post-school success, data analysis and the uses that go in hand with the data being analyzed, as well as current news and events that are going on and available for users to learn about and/or attend that are relevant to the topic of transitioning. 

I chose to research this website because I noticed that the NTACT link was consistently listed after almost every chapter in our text book, "Promoting Successful Transition to Adulthood for Students with Disabilities" as being a helpful resource relating to all of the transition topics that we discuss in class and read about in our textbooks. This resource would be extremely helpful for anyone going through the transition process as it discusses all of the important steps and topics of the transition process as well as providing further websites and resources to any individual that would like to access even more information. This website also has an area where an individual can subscribe to the site which will in turn provide them with emails that consist of current news articles that are related to the topic of transitioning, as well as local events that an individual may attend if interested. By subscribing to their email chain, an individual would not have to regularly remind themselves to visit the website in order to inquire about upcoming events. NTACT would instead email them on a consistent basis, keeping the individual actively engaged and updated on what is going on around them and ways that they can become more involved in their community. This website is a great place for any individual or professional to start at whenever they decide that they want to learn more about and/or prepare themselves for the transitioning process. Aside from all of the transitioning information and templates and activities that this website provides, I also really appreciate that this website has multiple sections included for states and local transition teams. These sections provide states and local teams with guidance, tools, and suggestions on how they can improve their current programs and make them more efficient for their clientele. This website really goes above and beyond to try to make a difference and help those with disabilities have a smooth and healthy transition into the adult world. 

I really like this website and believe that it could be extremely helpful for many individuals and professionals of all levels. This website really goes above and beyond to ensure that they are a knowledgeable web platform and can be of great use to many people. This website covers almost all topics of the transitioning process and even provides more resources so that any individual who is visiting the site and wants to learn even more about a topic, can easily do so. I believe that the creators of this website have done a great and professional job with developing this website and keeping it updated and current. I do not have any further ideas regarding anything that they need to change or fix to improve the website. Though there is not a place on this website that shows the number of page visits this site has or how popular it is, I have reason to believe that this is a very popular site. As I stated earlier, this website is consistently provided throughout our classroom textbook as a great resource for the reader to visit if they want to inquire more information. This website also appeals to a very large and diversified group of individuals. Therefore, I believe that this is in fact a popular and helpful website. 

Even though this website was originally made by families and for families, the creators have made an extreme effort to ensure that this resource is beneficial for a wide-range of individuals and professionals. Charting the LifeCourse states on its website that their specific targeted audience for this website includes; students with disabilities and their families, support coordinators and plan facilitators, educators and teachers, employment providers, health care professionals, and direct support professionals. These were all of the specific targeted audience that the company listed on their website however, after reviewing this website it is clear to me that any individual no matter who they are or what their profession is could benefit and learn a lot from this resource that could help to impact their lives in a positive way. Though this website was specifically made for individuals with disabilities and their families to help improve the quality of their lives, the framework and principles that this company created are noteworthy and impactful enough to change anyone’s quality of life in a positive way. 

Charting the LifeCourse states that the mission of their company is to “support families, with all of their complexity and diversity, in ways that maximize their capacity, strengths and unique abilities so they can best support, nurture, and facilitate the achievement of self-determination, interdependence, productivity, integration and inclusion in all facets of community life for their family members”. These listed achievements and skills that the company lists in their mission statement are all basic concepts that we cover and discuss in our Transition class, and read about in our class text, “Promoting Successful Transition to Adulthood for Students with Disabilities”. In fact, our assigned reading for last week’s class (chapter 7), focused completely on the importance of self-determination and self-advocacy for students with disabilities who are going through the transition period in their lives. Another one of this company’s core beliefs was highlighted on the main page of their website and it really hit home for me. Charting the LifeCourse states that their company’s core belief is that, “all people have the right to live, love, work, play and pursue their life aspirations in their community”. As a special educator, this is an important shared belief of mine as well. I really appreciate that this company not only took the time to state on their website that this is their core belief, but then took this belief to action and designed their whole website around it in a way that in turn essentially brought this belief to life. This company listed all of the core principles and values that are crucial to supporting individuals with disabilities and their families on their website. They made these principles and values the core of their foundation to building a happy, healthy, and positive lifestyle for individuals with disabilities. The listed principles and values and essentially the core framework of LifeCourse are as follows; All People, Family System & Cycles, Life Stages & Trajectory, Life Outcomes, Life Domains, Three Buckets, Integrated Supports, and Policy & Systems. Under each framework principle, lists its definition and its relevance to every individual’s “LifeCourse”. Each of these principles are links that expand into tons of information, personal stories, activities, other resources, and so much more.  Something that immediately stood out to me while I was looking through the website and awesome features and information that they have included, is that most of their core principles of their LifeCourse framework are the same basic principles that we consistently read about in our text, “Promoting Successful Transition to Adulthood for Students with Disabilities”, and discuss in our transition class. This is truly the most perfect Transitioning topic-related resource that I have come across yet. 

Another aspect of this website that I love is how user friendly it is. Even though much of the targeted audience listed on the website consisted of professionals, the Charting LifeCourse company clearly made a huge effort to ensure that the website is easy to use and that the information is clear and simple to read for the students and their families that this applies to. As I stated earlier, I think that this is an amazing website and there is nothing that I have found that I think they need to improve on. Everything that I have seen on this resource goes above and beyond for individuals in every helpful and knowledgeable way possible. Though there is not an area on the website that counts the number of daily views that it gets, I am sure by how well-designed this website is that it has got to be a fairly popular resource. I would be shocked to learn that it is not if that is at all the case. I know personally that I will tell all of my peers, future colleagues, students and their families about this website in my future now that I have explored it and have seen how great of a resource it is. I know that this resource could be a great help in many lives and I plan to tell many people about it for that purpose in my future.  

 

Goldberg, P. F. (n.d.). Pacer Center: Champions for Children with Disabilities. Retrieved March 11, 2019, from pacer.org  

 
Home. (n.d.). Retrieved March 12, 2019, from https://www.projectsearch.us/

Job Accommodation Network. (n.d.). Retrieved March 12, 2019, from https://askjan.org/

Morgan, R. L., & Riesen, T. J. (2016). Promoting successful transition to adulthood for students with disabilities. New York: The Guilford Press. 

 

NTACT: National Technical Assistance Center on Transition. (2019, March 01). Retrieved March 11, 2019, from http://nsttac.org/ 

The Job Accommodation Network (JAN) is the leading source of free, expert, and confidential guidance on workplace accommodations and disability employment issues. Going hand-in-hand with the topic of self-advocacy (which we read about and discussed in class last week) and the necessity of teaching it to our individuals with disabilities while they are going through the transitioning stage, with that being said it is important to also have other resources that will assist individuals with disabilities at any needed point while they are entering and a part of the workforce. Unfortunately, individuals with disabilities often face a lot more issues in their place of work than those who do not, relating to accommodations or employment issues in general. The Job Accommodation Network helps to alleviate these issues by providing personal and confidential support to individuals with disabilities in the work force. 

 

The primary audience for this resource is individuals with disabilities who are either entering into the workforce or have already been maintaining a job. I believe that it could be very helpful for the youth with disabilities to begin exploring and learning about the Job Accommodation Network while they are in the beginning and/or the midst of their transitioning process. By learning about this resource before entering into the workforce, individuals will already have the knowledge and resources that they may need in the future before or if problems were to arise. Essentially, these individuals would already have the assistance that they need to solve any workplace problems that may arrive. Our textbook, “Promoting Successful Transition to Adulthood for Students with Disabilities” states that “during the transition years, students with disabilities should engage in various career exploration experiences, develop skills to adapt to the social and environmental demands of a job, and learn the essential functions of each job”. Introducing the Job Accommodation Network to students goes hand in hand with what the book is stating by engaging students with disabilities during their transition years with job-like experiences, skills, and other helpful resources just like this one. Students will be able to learn and understand the usefulness of the Job Accommodation Network and how it may be of use to them in their future and greatly help them and their experiences in the adult world remain as positive as possible. By introducing this resource to the students ahead of time, they will be prepared and supported when it comes time for them to enter the workforce. 

 

Though this resource may not be as exciting (for me at least) as the other resources are, it is still an extremely helpful website for individuals with disabilities who are either going through the transition phase of their life or are currently in the workforce. This website provides a lot of information that is centered around employment and laws relating to employment and individuals with disabilities. I think that it is a good and helpful resource that covers exactly what it is intended to cover. Not only does this website provide lots of information, answers questions, provides confidential guidance, but it also provides current and local news and informs the user on current and local webcasts and training events which I think is very helpful. There is nothing that I would critique to make this website better, I think that this resource is already very efficient and helpful as is. I would imagine that this website is already very popular, especially amongst individuals with disabilities who are working in the workforce. However, I am sure that there is probably also a large population of individuals who do not know about this resource and would benefit greatly by learning about it. I know when I am a high school teacher, I will make sure that my students are aware and know about this website as it could be very helpful for them and maintaining positive lifestyles in their futures. 

 

Project Search’s primary objective is to secure competitive employment for people with disabilities. Project Search began at the Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. It has since grown significantly and now has locations and opportunities for young people with disabilities all over the United States. Our class and our text book in our class focuses completely on helping students with disabilities grow through their transition years and prepare for a positive future into their adult years in essentially what is known as “the real world” and the workforce. Our class specifically focuses on all of the important elements and principles that are needed to be addressed in order to prepare our students for a positive post-secondary life. Project Search is a great resource that can help make this transition for our students especially smooth and exciting. Students will be matched in the career fields of their choosing and gain valuable experiences that could hopefully guide them towards a great job that they love to do and will be able to maintain for the rest of their lives, or however long they choose. Project Search is a very well-known and well advocated program. There is nothing that I would change about it, I have done my research and I have seen how powerful the program is and how much it changes lives for the better. It is simply amazing. As a secondary special educator, this is a program I would love to work closer with if possible and connect my future students with. My aspirations for teaching is to help change lives in positive ways. By connecting with this company and connecting my students to the programs, this is one way that I will be able to do just that (along with many other ways). All people deserve to love their lives and enjoy what they do and if I can I hope to help as many people achieve just that in my future years of teaching!