This curriculum was developed by the Students with Disability Internship Project at California State University, Northridge to assist in providing information to our employer partners on different aspects related to hiring and supervising people with disabilities. Our goal is to empower companies to develop their accessibility for people with disabilities, make sound decisions about candidates' abilities to perform the essential functions of the job, and ultimately to identify and hire qualified individuals with disabilities.
We have organized these developmental workshop modules in an order that we found to be useful in our training seminars. Depending upon the composition of your group, you may want to alter the module order or emphasize some modules over others. You may find it more suitable to your needs to pick and choose sections from several modules to develop your own training plan.
When putting the workshops down on paper, we have attempted to keep in mind a variety of participant populations in a variety of settings. We must admit, however, that the focus of many sections is on training supervisors and human resource personnel. None-the-less, most activities work well in any setting. The first section, Program Planning, contains issues and tips we have encountered in planning and implementing our training seminars. This section includes information on Facilities Access Issues, Timeline for Implementation, Locating Meeting Facilities, and Locating Speakers.
Very little equipment is needed to use this curriculum. For most of the activities all you need is: an accessible room; desks for each participant; pens/paper; and an overhead projector with screen. We have included in the Presenter's Manual many overheads that are ready to be printed onto overhead films. Your local office supply company should have boxes of blank films, at reasonable prices, that are suitable to be run through Xerox machines. If you do not have a copier in your office, a local copy store should be able to accommodate you. Instead of using a chalkboard, we tend to use blank films with felt tip pens on the overhead projector; however the choice is yours.
The Participant's Manual is a compilation of numerous handouts. It is advisable to provide your participants with folders to keep their handouts in a usable format.
Most of the presenter's manual overheads are also made into handouts in the Participant's Manual. However, there are a few overheads not included in the participant's manual that are of value for the individual to keep. This is mentioned so that you may decide if you would like to include them in your handouts for that section.
When using this curriculum, keep in mind that the times listed in the 'Time Required' section of each module is a mere approximation of the actual time needed. Again, depending upon the composition, amount of background knowledge of your group and the activities you choose, you may find that you need to spend more time on a module than we have indicated.
We sincerely hope that you find this book to be useful when working with employers, co-workers, and service providers. Even though we have attempted to touch on many of the basics, we recognize that there are still many topics left uncovered and activities not included.