The Hartford Courant compares the Vista Vocational & Life Skills Center in Westbrook with a college or university. It helps students improve their life skills, build self esteem, develop friendships, and become involved in work and volunteering.

But there’s a key difference: Vista’s students have cognitive or intellectual disabilities.

An excerpt:

“We call it a life skills college,” said Vista executive director Helen Bosch. “If you imagine a university and people having to make a choice about where they are going after high school, for people with disabilities, we are like a university after high school.”

Bosch says many Vista students go on to be completely self-sufficient.

(Hartford Courant photo. Student Alyssa Earwaker lives in an apartment and takes vocational and life skills classes.)

This entry was posted on Friday, August 8th, 2008 at 6:08 am and is filed under independent living, intellectual/developmental disabilities, young adults. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.  Email This Post