More than 20 young students with disabilities prepared to take on their next step into adulthood when the Northern Burlington County Regional High School Transition Program celebrated its fifth annual banquet to honor the 2019 graduating class.
The event, which was held at the high school in Columbus on May 2, was sponsored by the Transition Program, where multiple staff members in the program discussed the initiatives and operations of the organization as well as acknowledged the accomplishments and successes of this year’s program graduates.
The Transition Program was piloted in 2005 in an effort to increase support and services to students with disabilities.
The program is also supported through state and federal mandates. It employs a person-centered planning approach with an aim to provide students who have significant disabilities with the opportunity to develop independent living skills, self-advocacy skills, and career skills that lead to gainful employment.
Officials from the program said it’s their goal to prepare students with disabilities for life after educational services end at age 21 with each student’s individual needs addressed through a Transition Plan.
The Transition Plan is completed with a team of staff members and is intended to prepare the students for life after educational services conclude at age 21.
One of the event’s main speakers, Transition Coordinator Jessica Volante, expressed her delight in the annual event, which she felt served as a communal salutation in bringing the students and their families together.
“The best part is being able to celebrate the student’s progress and having everyone recognized, and seeing their growth – having students who maybe thought they would never be able to get paid work, and then to have them set up with a job,” Volante said. “This event celebrates all the students work with their different employers, so the students’ parents can see what they are doing, and hopefully, they can connect with their parents continue what they are doing outside [of the program].”
Volante not only shared her acknowledgments toward the graduating class, but outlined the day-to-day duties of the program as well. She explained that the aim of the program goes beyond simply setting up the students with jobs, but to develop their personal skills and development as well in the workplace.
“We focus on getting them ready for being able to either during high school, but more so focusing on the transition from high school into adulthood,” she said. “We work on job searches, the interview process, job applications, and we do career-based tours where we take students out into different trade schools or different local businesses to learn more about that field.”
Since the program’s inception in 2005, Volante said she has seen its services branch out and grow as well. Although the program initially served a select age group of students when it was founded, Volante noted that the program has developed to serve students with disabilities at younger ages as well as the staff’s growth in numbers too.
“What we have found a lot is that the transition process for students can be very overwhelming,” she said. “Primarily only worked with students in the transition classroom, which was just for ages 18-21, but now we are working with any student with a disability.
“We also started with only five employers, and now we are up to 19 employers in the community who work with our students,” Volante added.
Officials from the organization said that the mission of the Transition Program is to promote independence in the areas of socio/emotional development, interpersonal skills, employment skills, life skills, and self-advocacy skills for students with disabilities. Each student who participates in the Transition Program has the opportunity to attend regular Structured Learning Experiences (SLE) within the local community.
During these learning experiences, students travel to local establishments such as grocery stores, restaurants, the laundromat and the post office. During these trips, students can practice purchasing goods, ordering from a menu, making choices, and operating simple machines such as household appliances.
In addition to participating in SLE, officials said that the students take part in unpaid job sampling opportunities. Northern Burlington offers on-campus, student-focused worksites as well offers them the opportunity to attend off campus job experiences. The sampling sites are arranged based on each student’s area of interest, skill level and employment readiness level. Students work with a job coach until it is determined by the program’s team members and the place of employment that it may be appropriate to allow the student to job sample without coaching.
When students graduate from the Transition Program, officials said that the students will have compiled a Transition Portfolio that will include a current resume, explanation of jobs that have been sampled, student response regarding those experiences, student interest surveys, and information for the student to reference for home and employment. The students receive their high school diploma at the completion of the program.
One of the program’s job coaches, Melvin White, also served as a keynote speaker at the event as well to honor the students. White presented visual presentations on multiple students’ experiences and accomplishments at local businesses.
White said he felt the banquet not only commemorates the students’ achievements, but serves as a way to make them feel more included too.
“It’s an opportunity for us to get all of these people together at one time – all the working components of this program coming together,” White said. “It’s about inclusion – making the students feel a part of everything that is going on – that they can achieve and be somebody.”
For people with questions about the Transition Program, e-mail [email protected]. Any additional questions in regard to the Career Orientation Program, e-mail jvolante@nburlington.