BANGOR, Maine — Teens and young adults with disabilities often need help with the move from high school into adulthood and have been able to turn to the Maine Transition Network for guidance.
State funding for the program was cut this year, and the group will disappear in June, but not without a last big hurrah, transition coordinator Cindy Tuck said Tuesday.
A conference featuring presentations about getting a job, getting into postsecondary school and living independently is scheduled for 8 a.m.-1 p.m. Tuesday, March 30, at Rangeley Hall on the Eastern Maine Community College campus, which is on Sylvan Road.
“We have a giant conference planned … for youth with disabilities, their parents, teachers and caseworkers,” Tuck said.
Approximately 125 youths, teachers, parents and caseworkers from all over Penobscot and Piscataquis counties already are registered for the conference, which will feature 20 different 30-minute workshops, as well as speakers and presenters, she said.
“It’s free,” Tuck said. “Parents are certainly welcome.”
Maine Transition Network is a statewide system for coordinating programs related to school-to-community transition for people ages 14 to 26 with disabilities.
Workshops about getting a job will include how to fill out an application and how to dress and present oneself during job interviews. Other presentations will be about filling out applications, using assistive technologies such as readers and tape recorders, and disability programs offered at the college level.
“Just because you get services at the high school doesn’t mean you’ll get the services in college,” Tuck said.
Representatives from area colleges and technical schools as well as Penobscot Job Corps will be on hand to answer questions, she said.
Presentations on adjusting to an independent life include how to ride the city bus or get a driver’s license; guardianships; how to shop, budget and save; and how to get into programs designed to help.
Once people learn about resources, they should “get on the waiting list and apply early,” Tuck suggested.
“In these times of diminishing resources, this kind of conference could be a godsend to a lot of people,” she said.
Karen Cole, parent of Faith, a 20-year-old Bangor resident with special needs, said the programs provided to her daughter as a teenager changed her once-timid child into a blossoming young adult.
Faith lives at home and works once a week as a cashier.
“It was very helpful,” Karen Cole said. “It pointed me in the direction of services she might benefit from. It was also very good for social networking. For a lot of the kids in that program, other than school, that is the only socializing they do.”
Tuck, who was named the Special Education Advocate of the Year for 2007, said it has been bittersweet planning the last Maine Transition Network conference because “my heart and soul is in doing this.”
“It’s so sad,” she said. “We’ve tried our best to keep going, but it’s not going to happen.”
Tuck has been told school departments will pick up the slack once the transition program is eliminated.
For more on the conference or to preregister, contact Tuck at ctuck@mainetransition.org. Those who do not preregister for the conference can register at the door.