Summary
Information on 3rd Year of the Disability Employment Grantees
Community Outreach
Program for the Deaf (COPD)
Tucson, Arizona
- Locations: Arizona – (1) Phoenix, (2) Tucson, (3) rural Maricopa County; New Mexico – Albuquerque
- Funding - $268,311 performance period – 7/01/2004 – 6/30/2005
By
combining job training with soft skills training, job placement and employer
support services, the Community Outreach Program seeks to improve high quality
employment outcomes for the deaf and hard of hearing in three Southwest cities
- Phoenix, Tucson, and Albuquerque, in cooperation with 23 area Native American
groups – as well as rural Maricopa County, Arizona, in collaboration with the
19 Nations Workforce Investment Board.
COPD has also targeted Hispanic communities to recruit deaf jobseekers. Each of the diverse project sites is in a
different stage of implementing the One Stop system for serving deaf
jobseekers. Thus, COPD aims to identify
the individual and system barriers to service and ways to remove these
barriers, such as adapting the environment, providing added training for
jobseekers, and adding support staff (interpreters) or buying technology. Systemically, COPD’s
strategy is to develop hiring commitments with area employers and to strengthen
the links between Vocational Rehabilitation programs and the WIA One Stop
system, SSA’s Ticket to Work Initiative, Welfare to
Work programs, and faith and community based organizations.
