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VESID’s Strategic Plan: 
Positive Trends

• Increasing percentages of students with disabilities are earning Regents high school diplomas. In 2000-01, 9.4 percent of students with disabilities who completed high school earned such diplomas, compared to 4.4 percent in 1995-96.

• The percentage of students with disabilities scoring at Level 3 and above on the Grade 4 English Language Arts (ELA) examination increased 6.6 percentage points since 1999, from 19.0 percent to 25.6 percent.

• Greater numbers of students with disabilities are tested on each Regents examination compared to the previous year. The number of students with disabilities tested has tripled and quadrupled since 1997. Increasing numbers of students with disabilities have also achieved passing scores each year.

• Increasing percentages of preschool students with disabilities are served in integrated settings. In 2000-01, 57.7 percent were served in integrated settings compared to 37.2 percent in 1996-97.

• The per-pupil cost of providing preschool special education programs and services has decreased 30 percent since 1993-94.

• For the second consecutive year, in 2000-01, the percentage of school-age students with disabilities served in regular education classes for 80 percent or more of the school day (49.5 percent) exceeded the 1999-00 national average of 47.3 percent.

• The percentage of students with disabilities educated in separate settings, apart from their nondisabled peers, has continued to decline from 10.2 percent in 1996-97 to 7.7 percent in 2000-01.

• Increasing percentages of students with disabilities are planning to pursue postsecondary education. Of the 15,515 students with disabilities who completed high school, 44.2 percent had plans to pursue a 4-year, 2-year, or other postsecondary education program. This rate is 2.8 percentage points higher than the rate for 1999-00.

• Of all individuals with disabilities who achieved competitive employment after receiving vocational rehabilitation services from VESID in FFY 2001, 92.8 percent were individuals with significant disabilities. This is above the latest available national average in 1999-00 of 83.4 percent.

• VESID is above the latest available national average in 1999-00 in the difference between the percentages of individuals who reported their own income as their single largest source of economic support from time of application for vocational rehabilitation services to after achieving competitive employment.

• Individuals with disabilities placed in jobs by VESID in Federal fiscal year (FFY) 2001 represent $230 million in annualized first year earnings and $25.1 million in public assistance savings.