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VESID’s Strategic Plan: Opportunities for Improvement

• A wide gap exists in State assessment results between the performance of students receiving special education services and their nondisabled peers. For example, on the Elementary-Level English Language Arts examination, 29.7 percent of students with disabilities scored at or above Level 3, compared to 66.1 percent of nondisabled students.

• A greater percentage of minority students are identified as students with disabilities and, once identified, a greater percentage are placed in more restrictive special educational settings.

• While the rate of placing students with disabilities in separate educational settings has decreased from 9.1 percent in 1997-1998 to 7.4 percent in 2001-2002, New York State’s rate remains significantly above the 2000-2001 national average of 4.2 percent. 

• In spite of a challenging economy, the declining number of experienced counselors and changes in federal criteria, VESID prepared and placed in FFY 2002 14,574 individuals with disabilities into employment. However, we are still working to realize our goal of helping 20,000 individuals achieve employment annually. 

• A lower percentage of individuals than in previous years reported achieving self sufficiency as a result of achieving employment. VESID continues to work with State and local agencies to enhance services that lead to jobs.

• The challenge for vocational rehabilitation is to continue to achieve positive results within significant fiscal constraints.