Welcome Address
W. Roy Grizzard, Jr., Ed. D
Assistant Secretary, U. S. Department of Labor
Office of Disability Employment Policy
First National Conference on Mentoring for Youth with Disabilities
Boston, MA
September 14, 2006
INTRODUCTION
Thank you, Regina [Snowden] for that warm introduction. Your leadership as Founder and Executive Director of Partners for Youth with Disabilities has helped bring us to this point – the first national conference on mentoring youth with disabilities. I want to commend you – and the staff that developed this conference – on this groundbreaking event.
I also want to acknowledge Theresa Clower, whom you will hear shortly, on the pivotal role she plays in the federal government as Executive Director of the Federal Mentoring Council. As I’m sure you will agree, mentoring is important for all youth, but can be especially significant to young people with disabilities.
It is also important that I acknowledge the audience. Each of you has made a commitment to mentorship for youth with disabilities. Each of you has the opportunity to play a critical role in the lives of young people with disabilities who will be the leaders of the next generation.
To the young people in the audience, I say, this is your opportunity to learn, to grow, to get expert guidance and advice that will have a significant impact on your future.
ASPIRE, ACHIEVE, EMPOWER
“Aspire, Achieve, Empower” – the theme of this conference. These are powerful words that describe the powerful effect of mentoring. This is what we want for all our young people with disabilities. We want them to experience the excitement, the determination, and the confidence to aspire to become whatever they choose to be, to achieve those goals, and to be empowered and empower others. They’re why we’re here.
Mentoring is one of my priorities and certainly an ODEP priority. As I was preparing for this speech, a line of poetry from Alfred Lord Tennyson kept running through my mind: “I am a part of all that I have met.”
I truly think and feel this way. From childhood throughout my life, I have absorbed a little bit from everybody. Mentoring doesn’t stop, just because we age. Every day should be a learning experience. We never know when we might meet someone who may change our lives. We never know when we may have the opportunity to change the lives of other. We should be ever alert for the opportunity.
As a child and young man, I had coaches and teachers who had a profound impact on my life. As an adult, I was a coach, a teacher and an assistant principal. One of my most significant mentors in the world of work was my principal. I learned a great deal about leadership from him.
I learned that it is important to hire good people and to listen to them – and to accept their advice. I learned that all of us have imperfections, but if we make mistakes, we don’t make them on purpose. We should take the lessons of the mistakes and move forward.
I recognize every one of our staff brings skills and talents that complement one another, and I use these to get the best results from everyone who works in our organization.
I think of these and other lessons he taught me often, and have tried to make them a natural part of my everyday life.
THE ROLE OF MENTORING
One of ODEP’s top priorities has been to improve career preparation and adult outcomes for youth with disabilities. We believe that mentoring can have a significant impact on the successful transition of youth into adulthood. And we’re seeing evidence of this through our mentoring demonstration grants.
* Mentoring is catching on. In a rural part of Oregon, the Youth Empowerment Solutions (YES) campaign has energized economically depressed communities by getting community leaders and small businesses involved with mentoring. YES coordinated a “Mayor’s Challenge,” calling for local officials and civic leaders to champion efforts to highlight and expand mentoring efforts.
* Mentoring is emerging as a societal priority. Legislation passed in Maine has earmarked funding for mentoring. Mentoring is on the social and political radar screen.
* Mentoring youth with disabilities with a focus on career preparation is working. It’s working in businesses, in schools, in communities, and in houses of worship. It’s working one-on-one, in groups, and electronically. It’s working in rural communities, in cities, and in suburbs.
And mentoring is leading to graduation from high school, to further education beyond high school, to jobs, and to successful lives. For example:
* A young man with multiple disabilities was struggling in and frustrated with high school when he met his mentor through Partners for Youth with Disabilities (PYD). Since he began his mentoring relationship, he has become involved with his school newspaper, as part of his pursuit of a career in sports writing, and has been named student of the month.
* A young man with profound hearing loss participated in an outreach program which provides job skills for the hearing impaired. When he entered the program, he was not able to understand English, nor did he have any American Sign Language (ASL) skills. Four years later, and as a result of his involvement with a mentoring program through the Pangea Foundation, this young man not only learned how to read and write English and become fluent in ASL, but has also discovered his talents and interests, and has gained skills and confidence to pursue his career interests. He became involved with a student apprenticeship program, and is looking forward to a permanent employee position after he graduates from high school.
* We have with us today Lisa Johnson and Linda Higgins, the Executive Director of Ethel’s Tree of Life, which has mentored Lisa over the past two years. Ethel’s Tree of Life is a community organization in southern Maine that mentors youth with disabilities with grant support from Maine Mentoring Partnership.
Lisa and Linda, will you identify yourselves so that we can recognize you?
Through the mentoring relationship, Lisa has visited shops, parks and libraries, and learned about her community. Her mentor also taught her to knit, which has helped reinforce her emerging skills in accomplishing tasks through a series of steps. Together, they are focusing on career and post secondary options. Whereas she didn’t think it possible before mentoring, Lisa is beginning an adult education course in the next few weeks, and will pursue college courses, but is taking it one step at a time.
CONCLUSION
I’m proud that ODEP was able to fund initiatives that have given these young people new outlooks and opportunities. But, we cannot stop there. Mentoring is not a one-day or a one-stop process. It needs to be a long-term commitment – both on the part of the mentor and the person being mentored – and it is meant to change with evolving needs and milestones in the young person’s life.
As we go through life, we may have several mentors. There are those who help us in our career paths. There are others who help us to develop coping skills. For those of us with disabilities, it is also important to find successful individuals with disabilities and seek their mentorship.
I applaud each of you in this room for getting involved with youth with disabilities. I encourage you to keep up the effort and to recruit others to make this kind of commitment. What you do contributes in an important and significant way to successful outcomes for youth with disabilities.
What you do has a profound impact. We are, after all, part of all that we have met.
I wish you a successful conference and thank you for your kind attention.
