Krysta's Transition Story

Krysta’s Transition Story –
Courageous and Tentative Steps
Towards Adulthood

By Kay Keeley and Kate Doyle

Krysta is a fine, warm, fun-loving young lady who came into her family through a loving life plan established by her birth grandmother and her birth mother. Her new family received a call just before Thanksgiving some years ago when she was an infant and she was welcomed into the family by her adoptive Mom and Dad. She was immediately the center of delighted attention, which she now shares with two younger brothers.

Early in life, Krysta had several surgeries to help her walk and see better. She also has had assistance from the Child Development Center, including speech, physical, and occupational therapists to help her overcome the challenges that life has presented her. Krysta learns best when she can connect new experiences to something she has already experienced in the world. She also benefits from a relaxed environment for learning and some repetition. Krysta has had her own spirit and determination to aid her as well.

Krysta has been very popular in high school. Krysta has four close friends her own age. She is very sweet, kind, and courteous, although sometimes quiet and a little cautious. She is viewed by her teachers as all of these things as well as pleasant and cooperative. She establishes good rapport with adults she trusts.

Prior to the beginning of the formal transition process, Krysta began working at her middle school picking up mail, delivering mail to teachers’ boxes, and loading a snack cart. Throughout high school, Krysta attended a summer transition program, working at Dogs on the Run (a hot dog vending cart), painting bleachers, working for the Forest Service, and assembling boxes for Pizza Hut. The Missoula County Public School Outreach Vision Consultant has worked with Krysta throughout high school, assisting with her transition assessments and site location as well.

For the past two years, Krysta was enrolled in Vocational Preparation classes as a part of her high school curriculum. She also became involved in the formal Missoula County Public School’s Transition Program as a participant in the Graduate to Work project. The service provided by the school included these steps:

An Individualized Education Program (IEP) meeting was held to establish Krysta’s potential need for assistance from two state agencies, Vocational Rehabilitation Services and Developmental Disabilities Services, and to make other transition plans.
Following referral to Vocational Rehabilitation Services or VR as it is called, the VR Counselor began the process of assessing Krysta’s interests, skills, abilities, and needs as they relate to employment. The Counselor helped Krysta and her family select one from the several Community Rehabilitation Providers, nonprofit private government contractors whose role here is to conduct assessments which will inform as to the level of coaching or other on-site support needed by the student in community employment. Sometimes these assessments lead to a job for the student, but this is not necessarily the case.
Krysta was also referred to Developmental Disability (DD) Services, a state agency that can provide a variety of services, including support for people who need help with life skills and maintaining an independent adult household, support for people who need help with learning new skills for a job as well as ongoing support on the job, respite time for families whose children live at home, and a wide range of other services. Krysta and her family met with her Case Manager at DD Services to discuss needed and wanted services.
Krysta’s family selected Opportunity Resources, Inc. (ORI) as their Community Rehabilitation Provider. The ORI Employment Consultant began the process of locating employers in the community who might be interested in having Krysta work at their business for a short time while our knowledge about her work skills and interests was developed. First, an Employment Consultant met with Krysta and her family to prepare a Vocational Profile of Krysta including her interests, her skills and abilities, her experiences at school, and limitations which would need to be considered in making good judgments about potential employment for her. Often the school provides this Profile. During the Profile development and the Planning Meeting that followed, we learned that Krysta especially likes working with animals. We also considered some other options, including stocking with clothing, working in a child care facility, and sweeping in a beauty shop, but working with animals remained Krysta’s main love; this was true even though she did not think of cleaning as a favorite chore and often work with animals includes cleaning cages out.
Krysta and her consultant were provided with a folder called a Portfolio, which pictures Krysta doing things at work, in the community, and sometimes at home. The Portfolio serves as a largely pictorial resume that the Employment Consultant can show to business people who might want to have Krysta be a part of their work site.
Working with Krysta’s Vocational Preparation teacher, an initial assessment was set up at Neff’s, a pet store in Missoula. VR funded Krysta’s wages, which were paid to her through ORI. The tasks to be performed included taking dog bones from several bins arranged according to size and content, placing them in plastic bags, and weighing them to assure that each bag contained the proper amount of product. Krysta was then to place price stickers on the bags and put them on the shelf for sale. The school provided transportation and ORI provided a job coach during this experience. As a result of this brief assessment, we determined that this kind of work did not appropriately bring out or highlight skills that Krysta could quickly learn to do well and easily. However, Krysta had her first experience as a person being assessed in a familiar environment where she knew the owner.
Krysta’s next VR-funded assessment was also arranged at a pet store, this time Pet Nebula. There, Krysta cleaned rabbit and guinea pig cages and was, as a part of her job, handling the animals and being with the animals. Krysta is a good and careful cleaner, thorough despite her low vision. At the end of the forty-hour assessment, it was determined that Krysta’s work quality was generally very good but that she needed to further develop her work pace. Luckily, Krysta was able to continue at this site with coaching as a part of her regular Vocational Preparation curriculum at her high school, giving her additional time to develop her skills and work patterns. Krysta received help with learning how to do her job at Pet Nebula from a job coach, this time provided by the Missoula County Public Schools. The coach was very creative in setting up an accommodation that would allow Krysta to get organized in the morning more quickly. She located a cart on which Krysta’s work tools and materials could be loaded, kept within reach while she worked, and kept in one place from day to day, thus eliminating the step of gathering all these together each morning. (This step is challenging for Krysta because of her low vision.) Again, the school provided transportation for Krysta so that she could get to and from work. When Krysta finished school in the spring of 2004, her employers gave her a dozen roses and she continued one day a week at this site as a part of her summer school curriculum. The owners at Pet Nebula really enjoyed having Krysta in the store, saying as she relaxed, she lit up their pet store.
Krysta has one more assessment to complete before the Vocational Rehabilitation Counselor can determine whether she would be comfortable and capable working in the community without long-term job coach supports or long-term supports. This time she has selected a retail clothing setting. She would like to clean out dressing rooms and return stock to the sales floor. The Employment Consultant will develop this assessment to begin in the fall of 2004. If it is determined that Krysta will need long-term supports (usually job coaching for more than a month at the beginning of a job), she faces a possible wait of up to three years or more on a waiting list before state agencies can make the funding for these services available to her.

A couple of final observations seem in order. Krysta is most comfortable with predictable and familiar things and events, with things she already knows. Krysta has been popular and comfortable in high school. Like many high school seniors who are looking ahead to an adult life, Krysta has approached her transition activities with some ambivalence - a combination of excitement at working, at doing something fun, and a feeling of anxiety about the end of school, about rapid change, about not doing well, about an as-yet-unknown experience. Fortuitously, Krysta loved her experience at Pet Nebula and somewhat to the surprise of all, has enjoyed cleaning the cages. Krysta says that she feels that her skills and her independence as a cage cleaner have grown.
With the additional information about Krysta gained from her school and community-based work assessments, and with the expertise and resources ORI, VR, DD, and other agencies can offer, we hope to find a good job match, one in which Krysta will have the supports she needs to make the contributions we know she is capable of making and to be able to provide the benefit of her skills to an employer.

Note: Kay Keeley is Krysta’s mother and Kate Doyle is her Employment Consultant from Opportunity Resources, Inc.

Collaborative Funding And Team Roles - Who Did What?

School:
• Discovery
• Marketing Portfolio
• Transportation
• Job Coaching

Adult Agency:
• Discovery
• Vocational Profile
• Employment Planning Meeting
• Job Development
• Job Coaching

VR:
• Funding for Vocational Profile
• Funding for job development
• Funding for wages for paid community-based work assessment
• Funding for job coaching

	Krysta’s Transition Story – Courageous and Tentative Steps Towards Adulthood By Kay Keeley and Kate Doyle Krysta is a fine, warm, fun-loving young lady who came into her family through a loving life plan established by her birth grandmother and her birth mother. Her new family received a call just before Thanksgiving some years ago when she was an infant and she was welcomed into the family by her adoptive Mom and Dad. She was immediately the center of delighted attention, which she now shares with two younger brothers. Early in life, Krysta had several surgeries to help her walk and see better. She also has had assistance from the Child Development Center, including speech, physical, and occupational therapists to help her overcome the challenges that life has presented her. Krysta learns best when she can connect new experiences to something she has already experienced in the world. She also benefits from a relaxed environment for learning and some repetition. Krysta has had her own spirit and determination to aid her as well. Krysta has been very popular in high school. Krysta has four close friends her own age. She is very sweet, kind, and courteous, although sometimes quiet and a little cautious. She is viewed by her teachers as all of these things as well as pleasant and cooperative. She establishes good rapport with adults she trusts. Prior to the beginning of the formal transition process, Krysta began working at her middle school picking up mail, delivering mail to teachers’ boxes, and loading a snack cart. Throughout high school, Krysta attended a summer transition program, working at Dogs on the Run (a hot dog vending cart), painting bleachers, working for the Forest Service, and assembling boxes for Pizza Hut. The Missoula County Public School Outreach Vision Consultant has worked with Krysta throughout high school, assisting with her transition assessments and site location as well. For the past two years, Krysta was enrolled in Vocational Preparation classes as a part of her high school curriculum. She also became involved in the formal Missoula County Public School’s Transition Program as a participant in the Graduate to Work project. The service provided by the school included these steps: An Individualized Education Program (IEP) meeting was held to establish Krysta’s potential need for assistance from two state agencies, Vocational Rehabilitation Services and Developmental Disabilities Services, and to make other transition plans. Following referral to Vocational Rehabilitation Services or VR as it is called, the VR Counselor began the process of assessing Krysta’s interests, skills, abilities, and needs as they relate to employment. The Counselor helped Krysta and her family select one from the several Community Rehabilitation Providers, nonprofit private government contractors whose role here is to conduct assessments which will inform as to the level of coaching or other on-site support needed by the student in community employment. Sometimes these assessments lead to a job for the student, but this is not necessarily the case. Krysta was also referred to Developmental Disability (DD) Services, a state agency that can provide a variety of services, including support for people who need help with life skills and maintaining an independent adult household, support for people who need help with learning new skills for a job as well as ongoing support on the job, respite time for families whose children live at home, and a wide range of other services. Krysta and her family met with her Case Manager at DD Services to discuss needed and wanted services. Krysta’s family selected Opportunity Resources, Inc. (ORI) as their Community Rehabilitation Provider. The ORI Employment Consultant began the process of locating employers in the community who might be interested in having Krysta work at their business for a short time while our knowledge about her work skills and interests was developed. First, an Employment Consultant met with Krysta and her family to prepare a Vocational Profile of Krysta including her interests, her skills and abilities, her experiences at school, and limitations which would need to be considered in making good judgments about potential employment for her. Often the school provides this Profile. During the Profile development and the Planning Meeting that followed, we learned that Krysta especially likes working with animals. We also considered some other options, including stocking with clothing, working in a child care facility, and sweeping in a beauty shop, but working with animals remained Krysta’s main love; this was true even though she did not think of cleaning as a favorite chore and often work with animals includes cleaning cages out. Krysta and her consultant were provided with a folder called a Portfolio, which pictures Krysta doing things at work, in the community, and sometimes at home. The Portfolio serves as a largely pictorial resume that the Employment Consultant can show to business people who might want to have Krysta be a part of their work site. Working with Krysta’s Vocational Preparation teacher, an initial assessment was set up at Neff’s, a pet store in Missoula. VR funded Krysta’s wages, which were paid to her through ORI. The tasks to be performed included taking dog bones from several bins arranged according to size and content, placing them in plastic bags, and weighing them to assure that each bag contained the proper amount of product. Krysta was then to place price stickers on the bags and put them on the shelf for sale. The school provided transportation and ORI provided a job coach during this experience. As a result of this brief assessment, we determined that this kind of work did not appropriately bring out or highlight skills that Krysta could quickly learn to do well and easily. However, Krysta had her first experience as a person being assessed in a familiar environment where she knew the owner. Krysta’s next VR-funded assessment was also arranged at a pet store, this time Pet Nebula. There, Krysta cleaned rabbit and guinea pig cages and was, as a part of her job, handling the animals and being with the animals. Krysta is a good and careful cleaner, thorough despite her low vision. At the end of the forty-hour assessment, it was determined that Krysta’s work quality was generally very good but that she needed to further develop her work pace. Luckily, Krysta was able to continue at this site with coaching as a part of her regular Vocational Preparation curriculum at her high school, giving her additional time to develop her skills and work patterns. Krysta received help with learning how to do her job at Pet Nebula from a job coach, this time provided by the Missoula County Public Schools. The coach was very creative in setting up an accommodation that would allow Krysta to get organized in the morning more quickly. She located a cart on which Krysta’s work tools and materials could be loaded, kept within reach while she worked, and kept in one place from day to day, thus eliminating the step of gathering all these together each morning. (This step is challenging for Krysta because of her low vision.) Again, the school provided transportation for Krysta so that she could get to and from work. When Krysta finished school in the spring of 2004, her employers gave her a dozen roses and she continued one day a week at this site as a part of her summer school curriculum. The owners at Pet Nebula really enjoyed having Krysta in the store, saying as she relaxed, she lit up their pet store. Krysta has one more assessment to complete before the Vocational Rehabilitation Counselor can determine whether she would be comfortable and capable working in the community without long-term job coach supports or long-term supports. This time she has selected a retail clothing setting. She would like to clean out dressing rooms and return stock to the sales floor. The Employment Consultant will develop this assessment to begin in the fall of 2004. If it is determined that Krysta will need long-term supports (usually job coaching for more than a month at the beginning of a job), she faces a possible wait of up to three years or more on a waiting list before state agencies can make the funding for these services available to her. A couple of final observations seem in order. Krysta is most comfortable with predictable and familiar things and events, with things she already knows. Krysta has been popular and comfortable in high school. Like many high school seniors who are looking ahead to an adult life, Krysta has approached her transition activities with some ambivalence - a combination of excitement at working, at doing something fun, and a feeling of anxiety about the end of school, about rapid change, about not doing well, about an as-yet-unknown experience. Fortuitously, Krysta loved her experience at Pet Nebula and somewhat to the surprise of all, has enjoyed cleaning the cages. Krysta says that she feels that her skills and her independence as a cage cleaner have grown. With the additional information about Krysta gained from her school and community-based work assessments, and with the expertise and resources ORI, VR, DD, and other agencies can offer, we hope to find a good job match, one in which Krysta will have the supports she needs to make the contributions we know she is capable of making and to be able to provide the benefit of her skills to an employer. Note: Kay Keeley is Krysta’s mother and Kate Doyle is her Employment Consultant from Opportunity Resources, Inc. Collaborative Funding And Team Roles - Who Did What? School: • Discovery • Marketing Portfolio • Transportation • Job Coaching Adult Agency: • Discovery • Vocational Profile • Employment Planning Meeting • Job Development • Job Coaching VR: • Funding for Vocational Profile • Funding for job development • Funding for wages for paid community-based work assessment • Funding for job coaching

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