Education Week - Diplomas Count - Issue 34, 2015 - (Page 17)

Twins Cullen, left, and Robbie Prall both found work after leaving high school in Alexandria, Va., with a modified standard diploma. Their mother, Crystal Prall, says the brothers could have benefited from more career direction in high school. BY THE NUMBERS: INTELLECTUAL DISABILITY In Virginia, Jobs Enable Twin Brothers To 'Walk Taller' After High School s Died 0.6 33.0 5.7 42.7% High School Exit Status (Ages 14-21) s Graduated with regular high school diploma s Received a certificate s Dropped out s Reached maximum age Number of students with intellectual disabilities (ages 12-17) 207,604 7.7 45.6 NOTES: Because of methodological differences in calculations, data on high school exit status shown here are not comparable to ACGR graduation rates presented elsewhere in this report. Details may not add up to 100 percent because of rounding. SOURCE: U.S. Department of Education Office of Special Education Programs, 2013 17.9 s By Christina A. Samuels Alexandria, Va. I Percent of students in special education with intellectual disabilities (ages 12-17) Percent in regular classroom at least 40% of day (ages 12-17) n his sophomore year in high school, Robbie Prall-tall, lean, and a huge fan of the Washington Redskins football team-told his teachers that his plan after graduation was to be a football linebacker. From his mother's perspective, the schoolinitiated conversations about her son's plans after high school pretty much ended there. "They never brought it down to be more realistic," said Crystal Prall, Robbie's mother. Instead, she felt that it was left up to the family to develop postsecondary plans for Robbie and his identical twin, Cullen, who both have intellectual disabilities. Both young men earned a modified standard diploma from the 14,000-student Alexandria district, which allowed them to graduate without passing Virginia's end-of-course tests. Now 20, the brothers live at home, and both have jobs they say they enjoy. Robbie works in the housekeeping department of a local hotel, doing jobs like delivering linens to be washed. He also works at an athletic-shoe store once a week. "Whatever a customer says that they need, I go back and bring it to them," Robbie said. 'TWEENERS' Cullen got a job at Inova Alexandria Hospital through a partnership his high school has with the national program Project search. Project search, which has been in Alexandria since 2012, places young adults with disabilities in hospitals and with other large employers to learn job skills. Cullen started work in September 2014, but a month later was hired directly to work in patient transport. Though twins, the brothers do have different interests. "I didn't like the hospital aspect" of Project search, Robbie said. But for Cullen, the experience was just what he was looking for. "I like being in the emergency room, transporting people. It's fast-paced and it's very social," he said. Ms. Prall calls children like her sons "tweeners." Their disabilities are not so severe that they required self-contained classrooms as they moved through school. But they also could not meet regular academic standards. Their high school careers were spent primarily in traditional high school classes, and so they could not be taken out of class for a portion of the day for job training or the life-skills classes she felt they needed, Ms. Prall said. "I think we do a really poor job with the middle kids that don't have the behavioral challenges and that don't have the total academic skills," she said. "The kids with the behavioral issues demand the attention, because of their needs. The ones that don't have the behavioral issues just melt in the back of the room." She added: "We are so school-minded, instead of lifeminded. We've lost sight of what's really important." Jane Quenneville, the special education director for the Alexandria district, agreed with Ms. Prall's concerns. The school system case managers who work with youths and families could do a better job of helping transform potentially unrealistic future plans into reality, she said. "How do you take that dream of being a football player and carve out something around the spirit of that job?" Ms. Quenneville added. "We do need to do a better job of training our case managers in how to have those conversations." The inflexibility of the school day for students on a traditional academic track is also a concern, she said."We have no time during the day to get them trained." Partnerships with Project search, as well as inschool job opportunities, are intended to help address those issues, she said. "We're trying to start them younger, so that they're better prepared" for transitioning out of school, Ms. Quenneville said. Employment has been a positive change for Cullen and Robbie, their mother said. Both have mastered public transportation to get to their jobs, and Ms. Prall said they both "walk taller" now that they are employed. "There's definitely this huge sense of accomplishment and success that they didn't have in school," she said. s DIPLOMAS COUNT 2015 s www.edweek.org/go/dc15 17 Swikar Patel/Education Week http://www.edweek.org/go/dc15

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Education Week - Diplomas Count - Issue 34, 2015

Education Week - Diplomas Count - Issue 34, 2015
Inside
After Special Ed., Path Is Less Certain
DATA OVERVIEW: Students with Disabilities In School and Work
BY THE NUMBERS: Hearing Impairment
Md. Senior Opts For University Geared To Students With Hearing Impairments
In College, Students Face Choice: Seek Help or Go It Alone?
BY THE NUMBERS: Emotional Disturbance
At Lab School, Pennsylvania Student Prepares for Career In Culinary Arts
After K-12, Students Must Be Self-Advocates
BY THE NUMBERS: Specific Learning Disability
On Road to College, Georgia Student Learns To Speak for Herself
For Job-Oriented Students, Work Experience Is Critical
Discipline Policies Push Students Off College-and-Career Path
BY THE NUMBERS: Autism
Budding Politician Sets Sights on College
State Diploma Requirements Vary
Common Core: Will Bar Rise For Students With Disabilities?
BY THE NUMBERS: Intellectual Disability
In Virginia, Jobs Enable Twin Brothers To ‘Walk Taller’ After High School
Graduation Rates Reach New Highs, But Gaps Remain
TABLE: Graduation Rate Tops 80 Percent
State-by-State Data

Education Week - Diplomas Count - Issue 34, 2015

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