Online Self-Determination Toolkit for Youth With Disabilities: Protocol for a Mixed Methods Evaluation Study

Background Youth with disabilities encounter many challenges during their transition to adulthood including finding employment. Jobs are often inaccessible, and youth often face a lack of support, discriminatory attitudes, and sometimes low self-confidence. Therefore, it is critical to help youth enhance their self-determination skills to advocate for their needs in the workplace. Objective The aim of this paper is to describe how an online toolkit aimed to improve self-determination in advocating for needs, including disability disclosure and accommodation requests to employers, was co-created with youth with disabilities. Methods We will use a mixed method design in which qualitative data (ie, focus groups and mentored discussion forum) are collected to understand the contextual factors during the intervention that could affect outcomes or explain results through the pre-post questionnaires. Fifty youths with disabilities aged 15 to 24 years will be recruited. Results Data collection is in progress. Planned analyses include focus groups and pre-post surveys to determine the impact of the intervention on self-determination. A qualitative content analysis of the focus groups and all open-ended survey questions will be conducted to understand the impact of the toolkit. Conclusions Our online toolkit includes evidence-informed content that was co-created with youth who have a disability. It has potential for educational and vocational programming for youth with disabilities. International Registered Report Identifier (IRRID) PRR1-10.2196/20463

Online Self-Determination Toolkit for Youth With Disabilities: Protocol for a Mixed Methods Evaluation Study (Preprint)

BACKGROUND Youth with disabilities encounter many challenges during their transition to adulthood including finding employment. Jobs are often inaccessible, and youth often face a lack of support, discriminatory attitudes, and sometimes low self-confidence. Therefore, it is critical to help youth enhance their self-determination skills to advocate for their needs in the workplace. OBJECTIVE The aim of this paper is to describe how an online toolkit aimed to improve self-determination in advocating for needs, including disability disclosure and accommodation requests to employers, was co-created with youth with disabilities. METHODS We will use a mixed method design in which qualitative data (ie, focus groups and mentored discussion forum) are collected to understand the contextual factors during the intervention that could affect outcomes or explain results through the pre-post questionnaires. Fifty youths with disabilities aged 15 to 24 years will be recruited. RESULTS Data collection is in progress. Planned analyses include focus groups and pre-post surveys to determine the impact of the intervention on self-determination. A qualitative content analysis of the focus groups and all open-ended survey questions will be conducted to understand the impact of the toolkit. CONCLUSIONS Our online toolkit includes evidence-informed content that was co-created with youth who have a disability. It has potential for educational and vocational programming for youth with disabilities. INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPORT PRR1-10.2196/20463

Understanding Offender Needs Over Forms of Isolation Using a Repeated Measures Design

A number of studies find that solitary confinement is associated with mental impairment. Yet, confinement dosage and which individual and exogenous variables lead to mental impairment have received less attention. This study of 2 years of data on disciplinary segregation male inmates employs a repeated measures design to examine how isolation affects mental health and psychological needs. The findings indicate that the duration of disciplinary segregation and incarceration, incidence of homelessness, and other individual-level factors had deleterious effects on mental health and psychological needs. Vocational programming and a high school education were found to be protective factors for psychological needs.

The Relationship Between Individual Characteristics, Quality of Confinement and Recidivism by Offenders Released From Privately and Publicly Managed Residential Community Corrections Facilities

This study examines Commonwealth of Pennsylvania state prison data on inmates released to a term of residential community corrections in either a publicly or privately managed institution ( n = 7,204). Analyses indicate significant associations of race, facility orderliness, extent of educational/vocational programming, and type of facility management (Commonwealth or a private provider) with an offender’s subsequent reincarceration. Results demonstrate that private entity cost efficiency and effectiveness claims are not supported, and the growth of the private sector in Pennsylvania residential community corrections may even be having a detrimental effect on desistence efforts.

Career Decision-Making Processes of Young Adults With First-Episode Psychosis

The first episode of psychosis often emerges during young adulthood, when individuals are pursuing important educational and career goals that can become derailed because of the development of major impairments. Past research has neglected the developmental nature of employment and education decisions that young adults with first-episode psychosis make within the context of their lives. The purpose of this grounded theory study was to advance a model of the career decision-making processes of young adults with first-episode psychosis, and the influences that affect their career decision-making. The career decision-making of young adults with first-episode psychosis emerged as a multistaged, iterative process that unfolded over three phases of illness, and was affected by several internal and environmental influences. These findings suggest the phase of illness and career decision-making stage should be considered in future vocational programming for young adults with first-episode psychosis.

“‘By Love, Serve One Another’: Foreign Mission and the Challenge of World Fellowship in the ywcas of Japan and Turkey”

By the 1910s, the international consortium of women involved in the interdenominational Protestant Young Women’s Christian Association (ywca) faced a reckoning. Over the previous decade, a largely European and North Americanywcaleadership had expanded successfully what it called the “association movement” into countries it designated as foreign mission territories, establishing dozens of multifunctional community centers across the Asian continent. With their religious, educational, recreational, and vocational programming,ywcas proved adaptable to a wide variety of settings. This success, however, brought the challenge of indigenization, a challenge that sharpened as Western women came to terms with anti-colonial agitation and egalitarian Gospel rhetoric of foreign mission. Detailing theywcaof the United States’s administration of theywcas of Japan and Turkey in the early 20thCentury, this article contends that interpersonal and organizational negotiations of power ultimately gave rise to transnational partnerships that thrived as theu.s.women’s missionary movement ebbed.

Employment and Social Outcomes Associated with Vocational Programming for Youths with Emotional or Behavioral Disorders

The authors examined the different types and amounts of vocational programming received by secondary students with emotional or behavioral disorders (E/BD) and their postschool outcomes, including graduation status, earnings, use of public assistance, and contact with the Department of Corrections. Generic vocational education and on-the-job-training had significant positive relationships with total earnings, whereas occupationally specific vocational education did not have any significant relationships with total earnings. All types of vocational education had inverse significant relationships with the dropout rate. Vocational education had no beneficial relationships with the use of public assistance or with contact with the Department of Corrections. The authors conclude that students with E/BD should be encouraged to have some type of vocational education in secondary school, although occupationally specific vocational education did not appear to have as many significant relationships as the other two types of vocational education.

Stereotypes About Vocational Programming for Female Inmates

Some criminologists have argued that vocational programs for female inmates continue to emphasize and to reinforce traditional sex-role stereotypes. These stereotypes are a form of social control if they result in limiting women to a narrow range of behaviors and roles. There is, however, a paucity of research that clearly focuses on who stereotypes whom as well as how these stereotypes affect behavior. This lack of understanding makes it difficult to assess how stereotypes affect correctional programming and practices. This exploratory study examined stereotypes pertaining to vocational programming for female inmates. Attitudes relevant to vocational programming for female inmates were compared between four groups: (a) female inmates, (b) peer counselors, (c) correctional officers, and (d) prison program staff. Group membership was significantly related to two of the attitudinal measures. Behavioral measures hypothesized to be related to these attitudes were also measured (i.e., the likelihood to perform certain acts rather than actual or overt behaviors). Additional analyses examined the relation between attitudes and behavioral intentions.