The U.S. Division of Schooling is investing $236 million right into a perennial problem in schooling: Serving to younger individuals with disabilities transfer from Ok-12 colleges to post-secondary applications and the workforce.
Faculty districts, state schooling and well being companies, larger schooling establishments, Indian tribes, and nonprofits may have an opportunity to compete for a slice of the funding, which goals to assist modern proposals to sort out this tough and difficult transition.
The Schooling Division expects to allocate round 23 to 29 grants of $8 million to $10 million apiece, for as much as 5 years.
Whereas this system isn’t model new, that is the biggest pot of cash that has been made obtainable up to now—the newest spherical of grants allotted just below $200 million.
AI goes to enhance the talent set of a employee. That offers me hope that we are able to diversify our workforce to incorporate as many individuals as attainable.
Eleazar “Trey” Vasquez III, a professor on the College of Central Florida and director of its Toni Jenkins Distinctive Schooling Institute
It’s additionally the primary time that the grants may be directed to nonprofits and better schooling establishments, a change made attainable by way of congressional motion.
And it’s the primary time that the grants have centered partially on two specific technology-related targets: enabling individuals with disabilities to reach jobs or professions that contain using expertise; or utilizing or creating applied sciences to assist individuals with disabilities within the office.
Proposals can give attention to both of these technology-related priorities or they will deal with a number of of three different areas: serving to individuals with disabilities who’ve been incarcerated or in any other case concerned with the justice system transition to careers and better schooling; helping individuals with disabilities developed after start in profession improvement and post-secondary education; and serving to “disconnected” individuals with disabilities—resembling individuals from low-income households, these experiencing homelessness, or youngsters who have been in foster care—as they enter the workforce or proceed their schooling.
Candidates’ proposals can purpose to assist individuals with a variety of disabilities. They embrace bodily disabilities (resembling mobility impairments or persistent well being circumstances), sensory difficulties (resembling blindness or deafness), mental disabilities (resembling developmental delays or cognitive challenges), and psychological well being circumstances (resembling nervousness, despair, and bipolar dysfunction).
These disabilities collectively influence a big chunk of the inhabitants. In actual fact, greater than 1 / 4—26 p.c—of adults reside with a incapacity, in accordance with knowledge revealed by the Facilities for Illness Management and Prevention in 2018.
And seven.1 million college students ages 5 by way of 21 obtained providers underneath the People with Disabilities Schooling Act, the principle federal legislation for college students in particular schooling, through the 2022-23 college yr.
‘New prospects for people with disabilities’
The competitors was designed to “actually promote innovation within the house of rehabilitation providers,” mentioned Danté Q. Allen, the commissioner of the Rehabilitation Companies Administration within the division’s Workplace of Particular Schooling and Rehabilitative Companies.
“There are a variety of latest applied sciences on the market, like synthetic intelligence, which may be opening new prospects for people with disabilities to participate in jobs that have been beforehand not seen as becoming for that particular person with that specific incapacity,” Allen mentioned. “I might personally like to see how these applied sciences may be utilized in a manner that might redefine what we see as alternatives for people with disabilities.”
Eleazar “Trey” Vasquez III, a professor on the College of Central Florida and director of its Toni Jenkins Distinctive Schooling Institute, sees prospects, too. He famous that knowledge from the Massachusetts Institute of Know-how confirmed that when AI is used correctly, it may possibly increase employee productiveness considerably.
“AI goes to enhance the talent set of a employee,” he mentioned. “That offers me hope that we are able to diversify our workforce to incorporate as many individuals as attainable.”
Functions for the grants have been made obtainable on April 9, and the division would really like candidates to inform the company of their intent to use by April 23. Functions are due on July 8.
The division will probably be internet hosting an informational, pre-application assembly to discipline candidates’ questions on Could 1 at 1:30 p.m. ET.
