Non-profit Trains Students with Disabilities to Expand Their Career Opportunities
(Saratoga, Calif., October 10, 2023) With October being National Disability Employment Awareness Month, there is a heightened focus on the career access and opportunities for adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD).
Historically, careers for people with I/DD have been limited to manual labor positions, such as bagging groceries or custodial work.
College of Adaptive Arts, a non-profit based in Saratoga, California, is aiming to change this with the belief that even though a person may have intellectual or developmental disabilities, he or she still can hold a job which require skill sets such as critical thinking, problem solving, and emotional awareness.
The State of California, along with Senator Dave Cortese (D-San Jose), shares this belief, recently granting College of Adaptive Arts (CAA) over 2 million dollars in the 2023 state budget for these new workforce development initiatives.
The U.S. Department of Labor has also validated these new efforts by accrediting CAA’s newly formed apprenticeship program, which combine paid on-the-job training with classroom instruction to prepare workers for their careers.
“If we want adults with disabilities to realize their full potential, we need to invest in their futures,” said DeAnna Pursai, Executive Director and co-founder of College of Adaptive Arts.
College of Adaptive Arts serves more than 225 adults with I/DD across 9 different states. CAA offers 10 schools of instruction in things like Digital Media Studies, Communication, Business, and Visual Arts.