EDS NOTE: At the end of this story, an individual with a disability shares his thoughts about employment opportunities. “It’s time,” he says.
PITTSBURGH_This would have been the summer Anbria Bates interned for either the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission or a tech firm.
Bates (pictured above) graduated from Penn State Harrisburg in the spring with a degree in management. She was weighing two summer internship opportunities.
But in April the cancelation notices came.
The COVID-19 pandemic forced the state to shut down internship programs. Bates’ offer from the Turnpike Commission was rescinded.
Likewise, a Harrisburg technology and electronics distributor called off her internship. The notice came with a $100 Amazon gift card, a reference letter and a promise to reconnect when the virus is under control.
“I was very disappointed,” said Bates, 29, of Harrisburg.
Canceled internships another employment barrier for people with disabilities
Because Bates has a disability, the state’s Office of Vocational Rehabilitation helped her in finding a previous internship that did materialize. The office’s sole purpose is to find employment for people with disabilities. This summer, because of the pandemic, OVR was only able to place one student with a disability in an internship.
Internships are especially critical for individuals with disabilities, who are outnumbered in the workplace. In June, 67 percent of people over the age of 16 without disabilities were employed compared with 20 percent of individuals with disabilities, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.
Of college graduates with autism, an estimated 85 percent are unemployed. In fact, young adults with autism have the lowest employment rate compared with their peers, according to the AJ Drexel Autism Institute. Fifty-eight percent of young adults with autism worked between high school and their early 20s and more than 90 percent of young adults with emotional disturbance, speech impairment, or learning disability ever worked, according to research done by the institute.
“Individuals–when they work internships that work out well–gain great competencies,” said Mary Brougher, executive vice president for operations at Bender Consulting. The Robinson-based firm is an employment agency for individuals with disabilities.
Bender offered virtual internships this summer to six students.
Last summer, Bates interned in the human resources department of the Pennsylvania State Employees Retirement System. OVR connected her with the internship.
“I was able to get a feel of every aspect of HR–from compensation, setting up payroll, discipline, recruiting,” Bates said.
Bates has some physical limitations as a result of an aggressive treatment she underwent for several years for Rosai Dorfman disease. It is a rare blood autoimmune disorder that caused benign tumors to grow in several parts of her body. She is now in remission.
OVR started internship programs with 17 state agencies in Harrisburg in 2018. The office partnered with the Pennsylvania Centers for Independent Living (PCIL) to offer more internships in 2019, said Ralph Roach, manager of OVR’s Bureau of Central Operations.
“Our focus from the moment we start a conversation, for the most part, is to help that person go on and find a career and become financially independent to the fullest extent possible,” Roach said.
State internships were expanding, then cut short
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Last summer OVR placed 22 interns at state agencies and seven interns at Centers for Independent Living sites. This summer, OVR had hoped to place a similar number in Harrisburg and expand the program to Pittsburgh and Philadelphia. Eight students were set to intern with the Centers for Independent Living.
Both the state agency and CIL internship programs were shut down because of the pandemic.
OVR was able to place just one student in a virtual internship. Roach said it’s a concept it may explore in the future.
Dennis Schlossman, 49, of Lewistown, who will be a senior communications major at Clarion University this fall, is interning with UniqueSource, a Mechanicsburg firm that sells safety gear, cleaners and decor to businesses.
Schlossman did an internship last summer in the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation’s labor relations department.
Schlossman sometimes walks with a cane because of balance and mobility issues following a stroke in 2015. He was originally set to intern in the communications office of the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission. But it was canceled.
He got the call in May from his OVR counselor about the UniqueSource internship.
He’s working 15 hours a week at $15 an hour helping the firm with social media and its weekly newsletter, working for the director of corporate engagement.
“For someone coming out of college, if they come out with no type of work experience it’s going to be difficult to get a job compared with someone who has worked as an intern in the field,” Schlossman said. “That’s where OVR is amazing. Their partnerships are fantastic.”
Pittsburgh firm retained all interns through COVID through cloud meetings, file sharing
OVR is advised by the Pennsylvania Rehabilitation Council.
Bender Consulting’s Mary Brougher is part of the council. She’s hoping more virtual internships can be offered so that college students with disabilities don’t continue missing out.
She’s pointed to her firm as an example.
“When we had to start working from home we included the interns in that,” Brougher said. “Our interns are doing data analysis, HR (human resources) work and recruiting work. They are all still working on our team.”
But Bates hasn’t been so lucky. In addition to losing out on a summer internship, she was furloughed from work at a small hotel because business was down significantly. So she’s used her time this summer to look for full time work, do the coursework to renew her real estate license and she’s trying to develop an app (she wants to get a patent so details are under wraps).
“I’m looking at entrepreneurship as well,” Bates said. “I have kept my momentum going and I’ll do that as long as it takes.”
NOTE FROM STORY ADVISER:
For this and other stories, we ask individuals with disabilities to join our editorial process. They help us see if we’re unintentionally “ableist” in our work, and share other thoughts on the reporting. The adviser for this story is Joseph Smith.)
“We live in a state of uncertainty. Therefore, there needs to be more work support, medical coverage, social coaching, housing, education for police and educators all of the above. If we are going to strive for a better future for people with disabilities, we need to combat the unfair assumption that individuals cannot contribute to society. The cost of living is too high and we need to be the torchbearers of inclusion and benevolence. People with disabilities have the right to work and help their communities to the fullest. We need to have a serious and uncomfortable conversation about inclusion. This conversation must occur now. Not tomorrow. Not next week. Not next year. Not next decade. It must occur now.”
(Read Joseph Smith’s essay “It’s not easy being a black man on the spectrum here.” Smith is a photographer for Unabridged Press. And his experience as a grocery store bagger during COVID is included in this story.)
