030. Transition EXIT YEAR! What To Expect

experience. Using your child's school experiences will help with doing some research, using resources at your disposal, be it a special educator, general education teacher, school admin, or if so supported a transition specialist, you're also going to rely on outside agencies and no lie. It is a lot of information, there is a lot out there and there is a lot to consider. Now, of course, trying to do it all at once can feel really consuming. So we're here to get the conversation going. Welcome.

We are here for the Post Secondary Transition podcast where we have conversations around the ins and outs, and everything in between the transition process for families of students with disabilities. I'm one of the hosts. My name is Patrick Cadigan. I am a special education teacher and I do have a co-host and who would that be?

five years ago. I know at some of my schools, you know, it's natural when you have like an academic life skills class, that the family has become close, the kids become friends, they're in the same boat, that you keep in touch with them, and kind of check in with them and pick their brain and just go out and have coffee and ask them how it went for them and a tidbits that they should know. So all their parents are a great resource.

And I know, we've talked about this before, different programs that have come from social media where parents connected and decided they wanted something different or they had a, you know, this goal in mind for their child or young adult. And they found other parents with the same mindset and took off from there so.

beneficial. If you're considering guardianship or alternatives to guardianship, again, we've mentioned before, there's no set time that has to be done. But just something you should have considered this point or talk to some other people. Same thing with ABLE account or a special needs trust. And again, we have a number of resources about all of this information, we've done podcasts on them. So these are some of the milestones that should be behind you at this point.

monthly. You know, just help for them to have a minute to say, Okay, I think I've got this, but let me double check with you. Or just send me a text or a phone call or cry on my shoulder, whatever they needed at that time, like, trying to help make life easier. That's what I feel like my role is

that I'm talking about? Do I have a certificate track student or which is to say a student who is not graduating with a diploma, but we'll you know, be finished from the school system with a certificate or a student who is going to graduate with a diploma. And when I click on the senior for the certificate track, but one of the things that I had noticed, was gathering school records.

on. If it isn't within the last three years, that might be a conversation to have your Case Manager or ask your transition specialist about. But it's definitely important for DDA, because they want the most recent picture of the functional levels of your child to show how much support they will need long term and how much funding they would need because it will help with their matric score, which we'll talk a little bit about

later. Now, if it's not your exit year, and you're listening to this, just take a look and see when the last time your psychological assessment was done. I mean, best practice I know in our county is to have one done every six years, if it's coming up on a six year and that's definitely conversation if you have a reevaluation

meeting coming up. I will say at the beginning of each year, what I like to do as a transition specialist is just go and check with my students on my you know, on the caseload at my school to see when last psychological

assessments were done. And if anyone has a reevaluation meeting coming up, and if they're exiting within the three next three years, just so it's naturally being completed, not always something that I think is thought about until last minute, so it's good to be proactive and just keep track of that and make sure you have a copy on file. You can always ask the school for an extra copy.

have Coordinator of Community Service?

all back in place. So at this point, you know, reach out or if you don't know who it is, ask for help to figure out who it is, make, you know, community, get in touch with them. And just start the conversation and ask them for support, because that's what they should be doing. And I know, sometimes they need their memory jogger, that you have an exiting young adults, because they have a large caseload

themselves. So it doesn't hurt to reach out more than once, if you don't hear back or go to the supervisor, if you haven't heard so.

involved with the IEP team. And I know in our county, specifically, we have a form that the transition specialist has parents signed called the informed parental consent to invite them to the annual IEP

meeting every year. And that senior exit year is the most important year that you want them there, because it's helpful for them to hear from other members of the team, like the speech pathologist, you know, physical therapist, occupational therapist, and it really paints that full picture of your young, young adult.

your young adult. And some have figured out how to do both, you know, do a little bit from an agency, a little bit of self direct and doing something on your own. So just exploring and researching both sides to make the best student for your

family. And visiting the agencies in your area, if you haven't already, again, your transition specialist is very helpful to help set those up and provide contact information, and even go with you, your coordinator can do this as well, if you have a relationship where you've been in touch with them, and they can give you more information on different agencies to we do have a list of questions on our website that you can ask the different agencies on your visit, which

are very helpful, because I know sometimes it can be overwhelming when you go in and we're looking around.

from her side. You know, we're the public school teachers, right. She's the what like the private the private sector side...

sundown. Well, that's not individualized, if you're trying to figure out how that works for your child you have to figure out is work is community exploration is volunteering, what is meaningful, you know, and start making those connections in your community to the things that might be meaningful, but also another option that parents have considered and it's becoming more popular and I know myself and another transition specialists have really been doing the research to explore

some of these, the post-secondary college experience for our students on the certificate track. ThinkCollege another resource that you can find on our website is a wonderful resource to help explain and explore the options that are available. Because the college has used an alternate admissions process for the students. But then once they're on campus, they have a very typical experience. So it kind of ties in what that inclusive opportunity that they've had their their whole school experience.

after application. But DORS is something that could be offered and provide some assistance with employment, and also regaining employment, if you something happened, and they no longer were employed, you would access more services than you would during the Pre-ETS services, you know, window. But the ultimate goal with DORS in the VR status is employment. And I know students who have accessed it while they're going to college, as long as the goal is to find a job after college.

21 and beyond. However, DORS, like I said, you can access it, but it's short term, and you can't overlap them, obviously, you're going to want to no, no state funding wants to be, you know, double dipping at the same time. So you're gonna have to work your magic if you're going to use both.

or agencies we talked about. You can go back and visit as many as you want. Or as many times as you want, you can bring your young adult with you. You can ask them as many questions as you want, but you want to at least have three in mind because especially COVID, we found it's harder and harder for young adults to be accepted because of staffing issues, being able to meet needs, so you definitely want to have backup plans upon

backup plans. So having a list and that's where your coordinator and your transition specialist can definitely help. You want to start can thinking about filling out the application. And there is a universal application, which your coordinator will help you with, that many of the providers do use these days. So you want to at least talk to your coordinator about that. And your coordinator should be, you know, on top of this, and should be following this timeline and

mentioning these things. But I know when you sit down and have a three hour meeting with a coordinator, your head starts spinning. And you're like, wait, they mentioned this, and I'd have to do this. And I'm not sure when this happens. So you know it again, ask questions. And I know it gets a little scary when you know, October, November is hitting and you haven't heard from anyone, and parents start to feel like they're behind the eight ball.

But you know, that's what we want you to know what should start happening. Depending on the timeline. And depending on how much of your information you have ready, the coordinator can submit for the matrix referral. And so the matrix referral. And we've talked about this in past podcasts. And I won't go into too many details. But that's kind of what gives you a number to determine how much support your young adult will need from

DDA in terms of funding. So your coordinator is going to submit for the matrix referral, which we've talked about in other podcasts. But basically, that matrix number is what will determine the level of support your young adult needs and the amount of funding that DDA will provide. And the score is basically two scores based off of health and safety and

supervision. Five is the highest and determines that the young adult requires the most amount of support, and one is the lowest determining that they are fairly independent and require minimal support. So that matrix number is is important to help kind of shape you know, if you were looking and I know a lot of parents, when we go into different programs, say my child needs a one on one. And the program will say, sure you can have a one on one, based

off of what DDA says. And what they mean is DDA saying if your child has a five, well, then they need funding for a one on one because they need the most support. You know, if you have like a three, you're probably not going to get the funding for a one on one. So that's another tip too. When you go to agencies, they're gonna tell you what you a lot of Yeah, sure, we can do that. Yeah, sure, we can

do that. But that's why you need to have backup plans, because when it comes time for the specifics, and you know, the real talk, they might not be able to do it. So just be aware.

you thinking of? And that's when you're going to tell them your top hopefully, three, you know, you have the top one, kind of like when you're choosing a college, you've got your top college, and then you've got your safety schools, well, you want to at least have two backups like we said. You can also tell your transmission coordinator. It's good to keep them informed as well, just so that they're aware and you know, they can help out if communications not really

happening with any ends. And then also, if you're planning to go self directed, you want to make sure everyone's aware of that too. You are going to be asked for different financial documents and other documents, personal documents for that waiver that your coordinator is going to be applying for with DDA. And that will be solely between your coordinator from DDA and you transition specialist. People from school don't have any input

on this. But just be aware that will ask you then to start gathering a whole bunch of different records. I don't know I think they also need updated medical like a from a physician or dentist like there's just a whole slew of things that come about so be prepared. Then come little later on the winter, January February March. DDA will provide approval for the coordinator to submit the waiver application and that is determined on when DDA says it's

okay. So a lot of times it's a waiting game, the coordinators waiting for DDA to give the green light to submit things. So you might not hear from the coordinator that up things might not seem like they're happening. But as long as the coordinators collected what they need, and they're just waiting, you're good to go. Because as soon as the gr, greenlight is given, then they can push the button and think the ball should start rolling. And you'll apply for the waiver.

You don't necessarily have a say in which waiver DDA kind of determines based off of, you know, the fact that you have a transitioning youth. And the top priority for them is day programming. So you would go on that waiver, in rare circumstances where residential is needed, because that's the difference really, between the waivers, there's one, that it's mostly just for the day programming. And the other one is for residential and day

programming. They would determine which one then and you can always change down the road, you're not tied to one. As you get older, if you decide residential is an option that you'd like for your young adult, that can happen. But for all intensive purposes, you don't have to worry about which waiver, you're going into waiver. That's all you need to know.

top priority. So your requests may not be granted, but you will still have a waiver. So you're going to work with your coordinator to get that waiver information in and then again, it's kind of a waiting game for DDA to get back to you. Communication is important, because you want to make sure things aren't falling through the cracks. So of course, you know, checking with your

coordinator. Sometimes there's been circumstances where maybe the coordinator hasn't had any luck hearing, but the parent was able to go higher, and the parent got some feedback. So don't be afraid to nag. You know, this is important, this is preparing for life, make sure that you're in the know, and if you need help with that reach out to your supports to see if anyone else can give you some guidance. So then come springtime, I'm thinking like April, May, June after the waiver application has

been approved, yay. Hopefully, it's all taken care of in a nice orderly fashion. That person centered plan will be revised. And that's usually when you would reflect what provider if you're going that route is going to be providing services for young adult. Once that's all approved, a start date for services can be given. And that would happen after July 1. And hopefully it's as close to July

1 as possible. However, if things are being held up, but DDA isn't with the waiver application, or for whatever other reason, it could be later. So I know that's also a fear of a lot of families that, you know, they're going to be sitting at home. And unfortunately, it's gotten better since COVID. But that does still happen, especially if you go the self directed route. You know, there's a lot of times that you might submit a budget. And DDA will come back with

questions. And you have to answer these questions and go back and forth. And so that your timelines push back a little bit. But again, just stay on top of it. And, you know, fingers crossed, if you have everything in order, and you're meeting, you're chipping away at it. I have parents that just exited this year that their young adult is already in the program, and it's August. So it is possible.

person centered planning. And that all kind of ties in to And charting your life plan, why do I feel like I've heard that Charting the Life Course, which I know in our county, the Transition Specialists are going to be getting some more training on but it really comes back to you know, you are not alone in this you have a whole group of people around you and you're young adults, and it's pulling in all these people that know your young adult from different parts of their life to share

what they feel, you know, is an important part of them and how it fits into the big plan and what would be a meaningful life for them. So you don't have to wait until 21 to start planning for your person centered plan if you know, you know swimming is a major part of your young adults life. Well then heck swimming is going to be in their day some form you know some shape or form if you know being in the community or being with people

their own age is important. Like that has to be front and center. Like it's just, it's individualized. It's whatever's important for your young adult and you before? I think I think they we discussed that when I was doing my studies at Towson, right? You probably did. Starting the Lifecourse framework. And we are lucky enough to have the Hussman Foundation, working with us. Yeah, of course. And it's just

it's a great framework. And we should also that could be something that can dive a little more into, as well in another podcast.

I'm looking forward to those conversations, and so many of the other conversations that we're, we still have yet to have. So I think that's going to be really cool.

had. Right. So that'll be really helpful. Well, I'll tell you what, then. I think this conversation, I think we're good.

whole lot of them. And one of the ones that I came across was the All Autism Talk podcast. And very recently, they posted an episode with the title Back to School Tips for Parents of Kids with Autism, I was particularly taken with this discussion, because they brought on a parent who was discussing her experiences around working with her child with autism. And as I was listening to it, I just found it. It was just it was a good conversation, lots of

useful tips and tricks. And I think that anybody in that situation will will find this conversation helpful. So I'm going to leave a link to that in our show notes for this episode of The Autism Talk podcast. And I think it's really cool.

revolve around transition. We've created playlists that cover guardianship, alternatives to guardianship, ABLE accounts, and still more to come. So be sure to subscribe there as well. And finally, check out our website which is chockfull of information around the transition process. And you also find our contact information there,too. So go to www.postsecondarytransition.com.