Employment for People with Disabilities

The Importance of Employment for People with Disabilities

Hi my name is Mindy Burr and I am the Director of Vocational Services at Easter Seals Iowa.  I have been lucky enough to work for Easter Seals Iowa and help our clients on their journey towards employment for 17 years.  I have learned so much from the clients we serve.

Did you know one in five Iowans has a disability?

According to a 2015 national statistic, only 22% of people with disabilities are working full time. Seventy nine percent are under employed or unemployed. Because of this overwhelming statistic, one in four Iowans with a disability are living in poverty.

For both people with and without disabilities working has many benefits. Working is good for our health and wellbeing. It contributes to happiness and helps give people a sense of worth, which builds confidence and self-esteem. Working also provides financial benefits, leading to independence. People in the workforce often make friends through the experience as well. There have been many studies showing the positive benefits on long-term health for the working population.

At Easter Seals Iowa and specifically in the departments I oversee, we support people with disabilities to be independent through employment!

Here is an email we received from the owners at Christian Printers Steve Hews and Bryan Goos about our client Justin, who was placed in employment with Christian Printers about three years ago. They said, “When we were first approached by Easter Seals Iowa about hiring one of their clients, we didn’t know what to expect. When the job coach said he thought he had just the right person for us we said, ‘sure, let’s give it a shot!’ That was almost three years ago! We couldn’t be happier with our decision! Justin has been a great asset to our company. He always has a positive attitude and excels at the tasks he performs which include shrink wrapping, padding jobs, putting books together and batching jobs in certain counts 25,50 or 100 (he does this better than anyone in the plant). When we expand, we will be sure to contact Easter Seals Iowa to see if they have another hard-working and dependable candidate like Justin.”

Justin is just one of many stories of people with disabilities being highly successful in careers.

Why should you consider hiring a person with a disability? It creates an inclusive work environment increasing productivity, collaboration and problem solving. Employees with disabilities have a lower turnover rate; the average for persons with disabilities being 8% compared to 45% for their peers.

Consider the following additional facts about employing people with disabilities:

• Only one-quarter of employees with disabilities need accommodations.
• Insurance rates are based solely on the relative hazards of the operation and the organization’s accident experience, not on whether workers have disabilities.
• 82% of managers said employees with disabilities were no harder to supervise than employees without disabilities.
• In a 1990 DuPont study, the safety records of both groups were identical.

I have learned so much in my time at Easter Seals Iowa.  One of my favorites is when I was “teaching” a client to mow the lawn.  Let me be clear, I had never mowed a lawn in my life but was up for the challenge.  As we started I asked the client to step aside so I could safely start the mower.  I pulled and pulled on the cord to start the mower.  As I started to get frustrated, the client politely asked me to step aside, he grabbed the safety handle and pulled the cord and went on his way.  This happened during my third week of employment at Easter Seals Iowa and as embarrassing as this experience was, to this day I use it to teach new staff members about the abilities our clients have.

How can you, as an employer, get started?

• Start small by creating job shadows, or internships for a person with a disability.
• Provide disability etiquette training for your team members.
• Do an accessibility study; Easter Seals Iowa can help.
• Make a commitment to hiring people with disabilities.

Thank you to our employment partners and to community businesses that commit to supporting people with disabilities in employment!