Choices, Challenges, and Options: Child SSI Recipients Preparing for the Transition to Adult Life

For young people receiving Supplemental Security Income (SSI), a means-tested cash benefit for children with disabilities, the transition into young adulthood is complicated for several reasons. Health issues, service needs, and lack of access to supports can complicate planning and preparing for future schooling, work, and independent living. These issues are especially pressing at age 18 because, following legislative changes in 1996, child SSI recipients have their benefits redetermined under the adult disability criteria. Some child SSI beneficiaries lose eligibility at this redetermination because they do not meet the adult SSI disability criteria. This paper uses newly released data from the Social Security Administration (SSA), the National Survey of Children and Families (NSCF), to study this transition period for cohorts of child SSI recipients just prior to and after the age 18 redetermination. To date, information on the transition experiences of child SSI recipients has been hampered by data limitations. Our analysis addresses this gap by providing detailed information on an array of program, school, training, rehabilitation, and employment issues facing youth during this transition period

More Work Focused Disability Program? Challenges and Options

This paper presents options for incorporating a strong return-to-work focus in the disability eligibility requirements for the Social Security Administration's (SSA) disability programs. In developing options, we first review alternative disability concepts from other private and public disability programs that focus on an individual's residual capacity to work, rather than an inability to work. We then examine the potential implications of applying different components of these alternative conceptualizations to the current disability eligibility requirements. Our analysis illustrates that policy makers must struggle with the real costs of creating a more expansive set of disability eligibility criteria that focus on work (which will significantly increase the size of the caseload), with the other costs of having an all-or-nothing disability definition

Policy Options for Assisting Child SSI Recipients in Transition

The transition process for a child Supplemental Security Income (SSI) recipient nearing the age of 18 can be quite complicated. From a programmatic standpoint, all child SSI recipients have their eligibility redetermined under the adult SSI disability requirements at age 18. Potentially more important, many child SSI recipients are also at the age when they must prepare for life beyond secondary school. The choices made during this important transition could have long-term implications for a child's future employment prospects, particularly given the typically long durations of participation and strong work disincentives associated with SSI participation. The purpose of our analysis is to examine concerns related to this transition process and suggest policy options for consideration by the Social Security Administration's (SSA) Ticket Advisory Panel. Our findings are based on an extensive literature review of programs that serve child SSI recipients and semi-structured interviews with experts familiar with the problems facing youth during this transition. In previous reports, the Ticket Advisory Panel has suggested expanding eligibility for the Ticket program to child SSI recipients age 17 to 18 as one possible mechanism for improving independent living options for this population (Ticket to Work and Work Incentives Advisory Panel 2001). We build off this initial suggestion by examining other possible mechanisms for improving independent living options for "transition age" (i.e., youth nearing age 18) child SSI recipients

Children at risk : their phonemic awareness development in holistic instruction

Includes bibliographical references (p. 17-19

Assessment of Post Traumatic Amnesia in Children Aged 4-7 Years

Post traumatic amnesia (PTA) is a period of cerebral malfunction following brain injury during which a person is confused and unable to establish continuous memories. Only few scales have been particularly developed to assess PTA in children under 8 year of age, however these pediatric scales have notable shortcomings and do not cover the entire 4-7 year old age range. The current study aimed to review the available pediatric PTA scales, and establish a PTA scale suitable for children aged 4-7 years. Firstly, a systematic literature review identified five PTA scales that have been used with children aged 4-7 years, but revealed that information about psychometric properties of these scales was often incomplete and very limited. Secondly, the developmental validity of a 10-item PTA scale developed by the Brain Injury Rehabilitation Team at Sydney Children’s Hospital (SCH) was examined in a sample of 52 typically developing children aged 4-7 years. This study identified a set of five items that are developmentally appropriate for the targeted age range. Thirdly, this 5-item PTA scale was evaluated in a retrospective study, using a clinical sample of 35 children consecutively admitted to SCH with traumatic brain injury (TBI). The 5-item scale was found to have good concurrent and predictive validity; correlating with initial Glasgow Coma Scale (GCS) scores, and being the strongest predictor of gross functional outcome compared to other indicators of TBI severity (initial GCS and clinical estimates of PTA duration) at discharge and outpatient follow-ups (approximately 6 and 20 weeks post discharge). Finally, suggestions were made regarding further improvements of this 5-item scale; proposing a 9-item PTA scale that has the potential to fulfill the clinical gap in the assessment of PTA in children aged 4-7 years

The Canadian Bioproducts Industry Analysis of the Bioproduct Development Survey - 2004

Bioproducts are often presented as one of the potential saviours of Canadian agriculture, offering non-food applications for agricultural products. However, relatively little is known about the sector or the characteristics of the firms. This paper presents an analysis of the Canadian bioproducts sector based on the first survey of bioproduct firms in Canada. The survey was performed by Statistics Canada in 2004 using 2003 firm results. The paper analyzes the responses to the bioproducts survey on two important dimensions, by region and firm size. The results indicate that for most of Canada's 232 bioproducts firms, bioproducts are just one part of the business activities, accounting for less than one third of employees and slightly more than one quarter of total firm revenue. Bioproduct activities provide both market and environmental benefits. The major challenges to the industry are financing and regulation. However, the relative importance of bioproducts, benefits and strategies and the focus and success of firms vary dramatically by region and by firm size.Resource /Energy Economics and Policy,