One-Stop career centers and job seekers with disabilities: insights from Kansas

Journal of Rehabilitation,  Oct-Dec, 2005  by Jean P. Hall,  Kathy Parker

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Mystery Customers

While each mystery customer had a disability, four of the eight had disabilities that were evident: one had multiple sclerosis and walked with a limp; one had cerebral palsy, with gait, cognitive, and communication difficulties; one had low vision; and the fourth was blind. The other four participants had invisible disabilities: one had asthma and depression, one had bipolar disorder, one had major depression, and one had recently been diagnosed with ADHD. Though we did not initially feel that this distinction between evident and hidden disabilities was important, as we looked over the information gathered we discovered subtle differences in the way Center staff treated these individuals. Our mystery customers' experiences corresponded to our overarching themes of accessibility, attitudes and disability awareness of staff, and services.

Accessibility. On the whole our mystery customers did not find the One-Stops to be the welcoming place our focus groups had envisioned. While our mystery customers found the Center to be mostly physically accessible, they encountered problems relating to the staff's lack of knowledge of disability including the use of auxiliary aids and services.

Upon entering the Center the first point of contact is the reception desk, which is approximately four feet tall, precluding the receptionist from seeing anyone who approached in a wheelchair and the customer who uses a wheelchair from seeing the person at the desk. No lower desk is available to facilitate conversation with a person who uses a wheelchair, a person of small stature, or one who simply needs to sit down when talking to the receptionist. While none of our mystery customers used a wheelchair, most felt this desk seems like a barrier to keep them away from the staff.

The Center that our mystery customers visited has an accessible workstation located separately from the other workstations and not labeled. The accessible workstation includes ZoomText[R], a CCTV, and expanded keyboard, among other items. Our blind mystery customer, when asked if she could fill out a form, stated that she would either need help or assistive technology. The receptionist told her they did not have assistive technology. The receptionist may have been uninformed about the technology that was available or unfamiliar with the term assistive technology. The staff member who eventually helped our mystery customer attempted to use the technology. Our mystery customer related the following:

   The man I was working with said this was the first time
   he had worked with someone with a visual disability
   and he had not a clue how to get into it [the assistive
   technology]. We tried to do ZoomText[R] [a text
   enlargement program] but that wasn't working well
   because we couldn't get the settings like I need them. So
   then he tried to use the voice reader, but he could never
   figure out how to do that either. We just decided in the
   interest of time he could read it to me.