UA Receives $32 Million Grant To Study SSI Recipients
by October 3, 2013 10:14 am 72 views
The University of Arkansas at Fayetteville will use a $32 million PROMISE grant from the U.S. Department of Education to research improving education and career outcomes for Arkansas teenagers with disabilities who receive supplemental security income.
Fewer than one in 10 such adolescents ever achieve competitive employment, according to Brent Williams, a UA associate professor of rehabilitation education and research, the grant’s principal investigator and project overseer.
According to a university news release, the PROMISE program is a joint initiative by the Social Security Administration and the federal Departments of Education; Health and Human Services; and Labor. The idea is that improving coordination between services can improve outcomes. Decreasing SSI reliance is a goal.
SSI provides benefits for adults and children with disabilities who have low incomes.
This is the first national study looking at the correlation between initial paid work experiences and later employment. Two thousand young people ages 14 and 16 who receive SSI payments will be recruited for the project. Half will receive job coaching and benefits counseling, and the other half will participate in a control group receiving no help. Data will be gathered over the course of five years.
“Adolescents who receive Social Security disability benefits typically do not have a first job or internship experience,” Williams said in the release. “As such, they remain cut off from the world of work. The PROMISE grant seeks to provide 1,000 adolescents with disabilities who receive Social Security disability benefits with their first paid work experience.”
The five-year grant to the College of Education and Health Professions is the largest federal research grant the university has ever received.
The university, the state Department of Education, and other state agencies submitted the grant. An Arkansas Department of Education employee will coordinate the participation of public school personnel.
Other states receiving funding were California, Maryland, New York and Wisconsin. A consortium involving Utah, South Dakota, North Dakota, Montana, Colorado and Arizona also received funding.