From the Chronicle of Higher Education (subscription required):

Vanderbilt University’s new Next Step certificate program is providing a college experience to six students with intellectual disabilities, allowing them to participate in classes and extracurricular activities with typical college students. The Next Step students also get job training and work on basic life skills.

The two-year Next Step program is among an estimated 250 postsecondary offerings for people with intellectual disabilities across the country, according to the National Down Syndrome Society.

Elise D. McMillan, co-director of the University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities at Vanderbilt, says the trend reflects the growing aspirations of disabled people.

“This is a whole generation of young individuals with disabilities that have grown up benefiting from the Americans with Disabilities Act,” she says. “They have been included in their public schools, and, in many ways, they have the same dreams and aspirations as their brothers and sisters and other students.”

This entry was posted on Wednesday, August 25th, 2010 at 12:35 am and is filed under college, NOT2BEMISSED, post-secondary education. 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.