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It summarizes evidence of persistent lower rehabilitation success for Black individuals and greater acceptance, service duration, and training for white clients, underscoring the need for equitable reforms.",{"@graph":14,"@context":73},[15,34,56],{"@type":16,"itemListElement":17},"BreadcrumbList",[18,23,27,31],{"item":19,"name":20,"@type":21,"position":22},"https://docshare.wps.com","Home","ListItem",1,{"item":24,"name":25,"@type":21,"position":26},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/","Document",2,{"item":28,"name":29,"@type":21,"position":30},"https://docshare.wps.com/document/research-report/","Research & 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Dahlia M. Shaewitzand Dr. Michelle Yin  \nPolicy Brief | December 2021  \nABOUT THE AUTHORS  \nDahlia Shaewitz, Vice President for Transition, Disability, and Employment, Institute for Educational Leadership, develops strategies and approaches to empower youth and adults with disabilities to create their futures and lead their communities to achieve greater inclusion. At IEL, she oversees a portfolio of work that addresses the systems change and collaboration needed to connect people with disabilities to education and employment opportunities. Since 2012, Dahlia has also served as co-coordinator of IEL’s D.C. Education Policy Fellowship Program, a 9-month professional development program that supports emerging leaders in education and related fields to acquire new perspectives and skills to function effectively in the increasingly complex, political, and changing environment of local, state, and national education.  \nDahlia M. Shaewitz  \nVice President, Transition, Disability & Employment IEL | Innovation. Equity. Leadership.  \n4301 Connecticut Avenue, NW, Suite 100 Washington, D.C. 20008  \nEmail: [shaewitzd@iel.org](shaewitzd@iel.org)  \nMichelle Yin, PhD, is Associate Professor in the School of Education and Social Policy at Northwestern University (Illinois), where she is also director of the Dual Master’s Degree Program, offered jointly with The Chinese University of Hong Kong. Michelle works at the nexus of education and labor economics, with a focus on special populations that include people with disabilities, youth at risk of not graduating from high school, and adult literacy learners. She earned both her MA and PhD degrees in economics from the University of Florida.  \nMichelle Yin, Ph. D. , She/Her/Hers  \nDirector, Dual Master’s in Applied Economics and Social and Economic Policy  \nAssociate Professor, School of Education & Social Policy Northwestern University [Email:](Email: michelle.yin@northwestern.edu)[ ](Email: michelle.yin@northwestern.edu)[michelle.yin@northwestern.edu](Email: michelle.yin@northwestern.edu)  \n[Office Phone:](Office Phone:) (847)-491-7377  \nServing All Consumers: Identifying Racial Disparities in the Vocational Rehabilitation System  \nINTRODUCTION  \nThe Vocational Rehabilitation (VR) program is the largest workforce program in the United States, providing employment services to people with disabilities to help them retain or enter competitive integrated employment commensurate with their abilities and capabilities. During the pandemic, state VR services were significantly affected and in some cases those services were halted fora period of time as agencies attempted toreroute services virtually and to eventually provide in-person contact. In addition, the Covid-19 pandemic has led to a recession in the United States that impacts all workers. Historical data in the U.S. show that people with disabilities are more likely than their peers without disabilities to drop out of the workforce during economic downturns and are less likely to recover employment after the recession ends.  \nFurther complicating the challenges to recovery are the disparities within the disability community reflected in access to VR services and employment outcomes by race/ethnicity categories.1 Racial differences in access and use of VR services have been documented since 1938. Wilkerson and Penn (1938) found substantially lower rates of Black individuals with successful rehabilitation outcomes than the percentage of Black people in the general population. These patterns have not changed significantly across the decades, despite civil  \nrights and disability rights legislation, and the continuous investment in VR services. Studies have shown that white individuals were approximately 1.5 times more likely to be accepted for VR services than their Black counterparts (Rosenthal et al. , 2005), were served for longer periods of tim","cbCairRYMXGse3qb","https://ap.wps.com/l/cbCairRYMXGse3qb","pdf",1595396,15,"English","# Introduction\n# Racial Disparities in VR Services","[{\"question\":\"What does the policy brief describe about the Vocational Rehabilitation (VR) program?\",\"answer\":\"It characterizes VR as the largest U.S. workforce program for people with disabilities, delivering employment services intended to support competitive integrated employment.\"},{\"question\":\"How did the COVID-19 pandemic affect state VR services and employment conditions?\",\"answer\":\"The brief states that state VR services were significantly affected, and in some cases halted temporarily, as agencies moved toward virtual rerouting and later in-person contact while the broader recession harmed workers.\"},{\"question\":\"What disparities does the brief report regarding race and VR outcomes?\",\"answer\":\"It reports documented differences since 1938, including lower rehabilitation success rates for Black individuals and higher likelihood of acceptance and longer, higher-end services for white clients, along with lower competitive employment rates for Hispanic and Black clients.\"}]","Serving All Consumers - Identifying Racial Disparities in the Vocational Rehabilitation System | PDF",1792051831,38]