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Facilitating Self-detennination With Vocational Assessment in Multi-cultural Settings
Robert L. Akridge, Ed.D. and Roy C. Farley, Ed.D.
Abstract Introduction
The purpose of this program is to present a
An overview was presented of how the brief overview of how the rehabilitation environ-
rehabilitation environment is changing. This ment is changing and to review two representative
change was related to changes in the way the examples of vocational assessment interventions
delivery of services are conceptualized. A new that are consistent with these changes. The results
paradigm emphasizing independent living, career of experimental evaluations of the interventions
development, and integration into the community will also be presented.
was outlined. The development and experimental Developments in disability legislation, pro-
evaluation of two career development fessional practices, consumer involvement, and an
interventions that represent the proposed service increased awareness of culture and appreciation of
delivery model was also presented. cultural diversity are changing traditional concep-
tions of rehabilitation. Concepts such as empow-
ennent, disability rights, independent living, and
career development place disability services in a
developmental framework rather than a medical or
remedial framework. Because of these changes,
the service provider role incorporates more con-
sultation, advocacy, marketing, and community
development activity and less gate keeping, eligi-
bility determination and other case management
activity. Such massive change may be referred to
as a paradigm shift (Lucas, 1985).
Vocational Assessment and Self=deteoninatioo
The speciality area in rehabilitation, vocational
evaluation, is in a rapid state of change because of
a major paradigm shIft in disability-related
services of which it is a part (Akridge, 1985;
Akridge, 1991; Chubon, 1992; Condeluci, 1991).
The activity of vocational evaluation has come
under increasing criticism during the past several
years (Stubbins, 1982; Vash, 1984; Moriarty,
Walls, & Mclaughlin, 1988). Consumers of
rehabilitation services and their advocates have
often seen the process as mostly a gate keeping
function which tended to exclude people most in
need of services-i.e., those with the most severe
disabilities and those from culturally diverse back-
grounds (Alston & Mngadi, 1992. Various voca-
tional evaluation processes (e.g., tests, simulated
work, medical and psychological reports) were
used to establish (I) the presence of a physical or
mental disability and (2) that the disability inter-
fered with employment. If sufficiently deviant
from normal, these indicators established the first
and second criteria of eligibility. The third eligi-
bility criteria required a high probability of the
individual becoming employed after a proposed
rehabilitation intervention. This raised the ques-
tion whether any available intervention was feasi-
ble? Being assessed too deviant on these eligibility
criteria lowered the probability of the available
intervention being successful. Being too deviant,
i.e., being too much in need of whatever qualified
the person for services, could disqualify the per-
son according to the third criteria.
An often stated goal of vocational evalua-
tion was to establish the individual's vocational
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potential. As the disability service delivery system pedagogy than through the curriculum. That is,
evolved a more comprehensive continuum of ser- what we do is more important than what we say.
vices (e.g., independent living centers, supported Effective teaching or training in a culturally
employment, social skills training, transition pro- diverse social system also requires cultural com~
grams, Projects With Industry), concepts like petence (Green, 1982). An awareness of
"vocational potential," and "employability" and culture--one's own and of the consumer of one's
their related operations assumed a less central role services is important in teaching, training, and
in the rehabilitation process. The concept of ser- counseling.
vices being prescribed as a result of vocational
evaluations, even to improve the person's employ- Review of Illustrative Studies
ability or actualize the person's employment
potential, became less widely accepted. The Two recent studies conducted at the
emphasis now is on empowering the individual Arkansas Research and Training Center in Voca-
with a disability to advance her or his independent tional Rehabilitation will be reviewed to illustrate
living and career development. The basic strategy the service delivery model being proposed. The
is providing skills training (in all areas needed for flrst study conducted will be referred to as Study
community integration) and improving family and One: Effects of Client Involvement in Assessment
community support systems. These services are on Vocational Development (Farley, Bolton, &
marketed to people with disabilities, employers, Parkerson, 1992) and the other'Study will be
and the community at large-not prescribed referred to as Study Two: The Effects onVoca:
(patterson & Marks, 1992; Akridge & tional Development of a Strategy for Empowenng
Greenwood, 1990). and Involving Consumers in the Vocational Eval-
In actuality, much of the activity that goes uation Process (Farley, Bolton, & Taylor, In
on in the name of vocational evaluation and work press).
adjustment might more accurately be called career
development because the speciality area has tended Study One
to employ a developmental perspective
(Bodenhamer, Mulroy, & McGill, 1988; Schloss Method. In study one, the following
& Schloss, 1982). By placing its assessment methodology was used. Every other cohort group
capacity at the service of persons with disabilities, admitted to a comprehensive rehabilitation center
the speciality area makes an enormous contribu- drawing referrals from all regions of one state
tion to the person's development of her or his were assigned to the experimental condition and
career, in addition to providing a data base for received the two vocational development interven~
consulting with other professional members of the tions in study one. Alternate cohort groups served
rehabilitation team. Career development involves as controls. Both groups participated in the
an ongoing assessment of present performance, center's regular vocational evaluation program but
utilizing all available resources including profes- the control condition included additional exposure
sional consultation, while learning to improve to work sampling.
one's adaptive skills and support systems. It is The difference scores from a battery of
from this perspective that rehabilitation services self-report measures and a standardized vocational
need to be delivered in order to be empowering maturity interview administered pre- and post
and to be consistent with the 1993 Amendments to were analyzed with individual t-tests.
the Rehabilitation Act and the Americans With Participants. Participants were 75 voca~
Disabilities Act of 1992. Rehabilitation service tional rehabilitation clients enrolled in the
providers, including those in activities called vocational evaluation section of a comprehensive
vocational evaluation or career development, will rehabilitation facility in the southwestern United
need to improve their skills for working with States. The sample was 71 percent male and
people with more severe disabilities and particu- ranged in age from 17 to 55 years, with a mean
larly those from culturally diverse backgrounds. age of 24 years. Distribution by race was:
white-77 percent, black-22 percent, and
Vocational Assessment and Cultural Competence other-l percent. Participants had completed from
People from backgrounds other than the 6 to 16 years of education with a mean of II
cultural mainstream (majority group culture) are years. The major disabilities represented were 36
underserved by the present disability service percent orthopedic, 32 percent other medIcal dIS-
delivery system-both in terms of percent of eli- abilities, 14 percent mental retardatlon, 11 percent
gible persons served and quality of outcomes psychiatric, and 7 percent sensory.
(Walker, Belgrave, Nicholls, & Turner, 1991;
Alston & Mngadi, 1992). Providing effective Intervention. The independent variable in
rehabilitation services requires cultural compe~ this study was a vocational exploration and plan-
tenee. Improving cultural competences throughout ning intervention consisting of two structured
the service delivery system offers one of the most programs designed to involve the client in the ,
promising strategies for responding to previously vocational decision~making process. One was a
underserved populations. small group vocational exploration program titled
A consensus is building among the teach~ Occupational Choice Strategy (OCS; Roessler &
ing and training professions that multi-cultural Schriner, 1988). The other was a one~to~one
concerns can better be addressed through approach titled Know Thyself (KT; Farley,
Parkerson, Farley, & Martin, 1990).
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The OCS program consists of 12 hours of control groups in their expressed satisfac-
instruction. A series of individual and group tion with evaluation services.
activities. is used to guide the participants through
three major components: Understanding Self, Study Two
KnOWIng the World of Work, and Making a
Vocational Choice and Plan. The components ~. The methodology for the second
respectively are designed to increase a partici- study was similar to the fIrst study except a) only
pant's a) knowledge of self in the areas of work one intervention (Know Thyself) was employed,
values and needs, interests, aptitudes, and per- b) the Know Thyself intervention was carried out
sonal strengths and limitations; b) knowledge of by the clients' center counselors whom had been
the ~ork world, suc~ as available jobs, their randomly selected and trained by the research
requIrements, educabon needed, and future out- assistant who carried out all the Know Thyself
look; and c) vocational decision-making skills interventions in Study One, and c) the outcome
resulting in the selection of a goal and a plan to measures were administered at posttest only.
achieve the goal. Particioants. Participants were 60 voca-
To put into operation Vash's Know Thyself tional rehabilitation clients enrolled in the
Ml!n!!l!! (1984), Farley, Parkerson, Farley, and vocational evaluation section of a comprehensive
Martin (1990) developed the Know Thyself Inter- rehabilitation facility in the southeastern United
venbon, a procedure for describing the evaluation States. Si
process and sharing evaluation results with clients. ranged from 17 to 47 years with a median of 32.
The Know Thyself approach consists of appro
mately 2 to 3 hours of one-to-one discussion of black-18 percent, and other-2 percent. The
the evaluation process, the evaluation results and major disabilities represented were 36 percent
their implications for service planning. Each 'par- orthopedic, 24 percent psychiatric, 22 percent
tlc~pant IS l~SUed a notebook containing learning disabled, 9 percent other medical disabil-
a) InfOrmabon about the evaluation process and ities, 5 percent mental retardation, and 3 percent
evaluation tests and procedures that are used' b) a sensory.
guide to discuss test results; and c) a structur'e to
plan actions and service based on the results. Intervention. The independent variable in
Study Two was limited to the Know Thyself
Dependent Measures and Results. To eval- Intervention of one~on-one career planning
uate the intervention, five dependent measures described in Study One. This program manual was
were used to test five hypotheses: specifically designed to empower and involve re-
I. On the Vocational Self-Awareness Scale habilitation clients in the vocational evaluation and
(Farley, 1988), the e
demonstrated a significantly greater
improvement in knowledge of personal Dependent Measures and ResullS. The first
attributes in relation to vocational choice four measures used in Study One were also used
than the control group, which also made in Study Two. The e
modest improvement. the Know Thyself intervention showed signifI-
2. On the My Vocational Situation (MVS) cantly more gain on all four measures at or be-
Scale (Holland, Daiger, & Poer, 1986), yond the .02 level of confidence. These measures
the expenmental group demonstrated a tapped the following constructs: vocational self-
significantly larger gain in confidence in awareness, confidence in onels vocational decision
vocational decision-making ability than the making, career indecisiveness and vocational
control group, which evidenced modest maturity. The fifth measure was a structured self-
improvement. rating of perceived involvement in the evaluation
3. On the Career Decision Scale (Osipow, process. In the first study clients had responded to
1980), the difference in gain scores be- a more general client satisfaction measure and the
tween the e
approached significance (p = .07), sug- groups were not significantly different. For the
gesbng greater gaIn on the part of the perceived involvement measure in the second
e
control group, which changed only volvement which was significantly different at the
slightly. .03 level. Analysis of all five dependent variables
4. On the Employability maturity Interview simultaneously using MANOV A resulted in an
(Morelock, Roessler, & Bolton, 1987), the 1:(5, 50) = 2.58, P < .02, which substantiated an
e
sho~ed substantial and similar gains in The hypothesis was supported that voca-
readmess for vocational rehabilitation tional evaluation participants who engaged in
planning (more than half a standard devia- Know Thyself activities would demonstrate a
tion); hence, no difference was found greater degree of vocational development when
between the groups. compared to those receiving routine evaluation·
5. On the Program Satisfaction Survey, which services .
. was desIgned for thIS study, no differences
were found between the experimental and
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Discussion Akridge, R. L. (1991). A proposed strategy for
assessing how responsive communlties are to
Adapting a client centered or partnership the independent living and career develop-
approach to vocational evaluation emphasizes ment needs of persons with severe disabili-
doing things with clients rather than to clients. ties. Fifth National Forum on Issues in Vo-
Making the expertise and assessment tools of cational Assessment. Menomonie: University
vocational evaluation more accessible is empow- of Wisconsin, Stout Vocational Rehabilitation
ering to individuals with disabilities. Consumers Institute.
can use the data generated in assessment to guide Akridge, R. L., & Greenwood, R. (1990).
their own career development. When the results of Marketing rehabilitation. Procml\ngs of the
vocational evaluation are handed down from a Seventh Annual NReA Training Symposium,
professional expert the person with a disability is Boston, MA.
not involved in a developmental process. Special Alston, R. J., & Mngadi, S. (1992). The interac-
precautions are needed to structure the situation so tion between disability status and the Afncan
as not to emphasize the difference in status of the American experience: Implications fa! reha-
client and the professional. This is particularly bilitation counseling. Journal of ApplIed
true when the client must cope, in a triad situa- Rehabilitation Counseling, 21(2), 12-16.
tion, with a counselor and a vocational evaluator. Bolton, B. (Ed.) (1987). Handbook of measure-
In addition to status role differences, reha- ment and evaluation in rehabilitation (2nd
bilitation service providers are seen as represent- ed.). Baltimore, MD: Paul Brookes.
ing the majority group culture (even if they Bolton, B. (Ed.) (1988). Special education and
happen to be a minority group member) while rehabilitation testing- Current practIces and
having a severe disability places one in a minority test reviews. Austin, TX: Pro-Ed.
group status. Many persons receiving services are Chubon, R. A. (1992). Defining rehabilitation
also from culturally diverse backgrounds which from a systems per~tive: Critical implica-
have exposed them to prejudice and discrimination tions. Journal of ApplIed RehabIlItatIOn
from the majority culture. Strategies such as Counseling, 23(1), 27-32.
career exploration in a small cohesive group of Condeluci, A. (1991). Interdependence: The route
peers and the Know Thyself manual which repre- to community. Rehab USA, Summer, 12-14.
sent state-of-the-art career counseling may help Farley, R. C. (1988). Vocational Self-Awareness
avoid either fostering dependency or rejection of Soak. Fayetteville, AR: University of
services and may facilitate empowerment. These Arkansas Research and Training Center in
interventions are also representative of those most Vocational Rehabilitation.
able to accommodate multi-cultural diversity. Farley, R., Bolton, B., & Parkerson, S. (1992).
Effects of client involvement to assessment
Summary on vocational development. Rehabilitation
Counseling Bulletin, ~(3), 146-153.
A paradigm change encompassing disabil- Farley, R., Bolton, B., & Taylor, I. (in press).
ity services, human services, and the culture at The effects on vocational development of a
large is underway. This shift is to a systemic per- strategy for empowering and involving con-
spective focusing on community development and sumers in the vocational evaluation process.
working through families and with individuals. Vocational Evaluation and Work Adjustment
The mission is to empower individuals with dis- Bulletin.
abilities to set their own independent living and Farley, R., Parkerson, S., Farley, 0., & Martin,
career goals, develop programs to achieve them, N. (1992). Know thyself' An emoowerment
and evaluate the results in terms of their own strategy for involving cons~mers in the voca-
valued criteria. tional evaluation and planmng process.
Two state-of-the-art career development Fayetteville: University of Mkansas Research
interventions were carried out within a traditional and Training Center In Vocational RehabIli-
vocational evaluation program and evaluated for tation.
its impact on clients' level of career development. Green, I. W. (1982). Cultural awarenes, in Ihe
Support was especially strong for the individual human services. Englewood Cliff, NI:
planning intervention, Know Thyself. Prentice-Hall, Inc.
Holland,l. L., Daiger, D. C., & Power, P. G.
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(Eds.~)~~~:?e
eoee co-sponsored the President's Com-
mittee on Employment of People with Dis-
abilities and Howard University Research and
Training Center for Access to Rehabilitation
and Economic Opportunity.
Robert L. Akridge, Ed.D.
Roy C. Farley, Ed.D.
University of Arkansas
Research and Training Center in
VocationaJ Rehabilitation
P. O. Box 1358
Hot Springs, AR 71902
215