Advancing Opportunities for HS Students in IDD Arena
A small, but meaningful, success.
It all started with Children’s Center Programs, a board member of ABCD. Alan Fazzari, Chief Quality and Strategy Officer for CCP’s Day Programs who is also an adjunct professor at Monmouth University has collaborated with the faculty and staff to host programs and events for the day habilitation program, providing Monmouth students, from graduate nursing students to athletic teams, with a bridge into the community. Some continue to work with the IDD population, post-graduation. But Alan wasn’t going to stop there. He knew that to help ensure the future talent drawn to our industry, people who had no connection with our population needed opportunities to be exposed earlier to the possibilities of our community.
So CCP, Alan and his team created a partnership with a high school which focuses on health sciences and is part of the Monmouth County Vocational School System. CCP presented several seminars on IDD and the job of a DSP, and hosted field trips and activities on their campus. As a result, the principal, teacher(s), and students expressed a desire to use CCP’s setting to complete volunteer hours for interested students to graduate their specialized program. CCP and ABCD set out on what became a very long, but successful advocacy journey to find out how high school students can volunteer at their day habilitation program under the direction, authority, and complete oversight of fully trained and approved supervisors, to accrue necessary required health care/human services hours to meet their graduation requirements. For now, we are treating this as a pilot program.
It goes without saying that advancing the relationship and opportunities afforded to students is an important investment for the future strength and stability of the DDD and human service workforce. Our thanks to Alan and CCP for leading the way and to the many DDD/DHS staff who were committed to finding a way to make this work.
