VOCATIONAL EVALUATION
Admission Requirements
Throughout our lives we are faced with the difficult task of trying to find that "perfect " job. For individuals with barriers to employment, this process is even more difficult. The role of the vocational evaluator is to assist individuals who are disabled or disadvantaged identify appropriate education, training, jobs and career paths, in order to improve their overall quality of life.
Vocational evaluation uses many of the clinical skills found in psychology, counseling, and education, such as file review, diagnostic interviewing, standardized testing, behavioral observation, data interpretation, and vocational/career decision making. However, a unique aspect of the vocational evaluation process is the additional use of real and simulated work activities and instruments. To explore vocational interest and potential and identify accommodations and supports.
Vocational evaluators work in vocational rehabilitation agency offices, rehabilitation facilities, community rehabilitation programs, hospitals, institutions, secondary public schools, community colleges, private industry, and private practice.
Roles and Responsibilities
Assists people with a wide range of physical, mental, and emotional disabilities or who are disadvantaged, to identify appropriate vocational interests, abilities, opportunities and service needs.
Provides necessary evaluation services including vocational, educational, personal, social, residential, environmental and community, in order to examine their impact on an individual's overall career development and employment success.
Formulates a variety of employment, transition, education, and rehabilitation recommendations to be used as a planning tool by clients/students and their counselors/teachers. This promotes the process of empowerment and informed choice.
Works on interdisciplinary teams to meet the total needs of persons who are disabled or disadvantaged.
Technical Standards of Practice for Vocational Evaluators
Vocational evaluation is a profession that helps people match their knowledge, skills and abilities with a career path. Vocational evaluators use a variety of tools to insure the career match provides success and satisfaction. Vocational evaluation is defined as a comprehensive process that systemically uses work, either real or simulated, as the focal point for assessment and vocational exploration, the purpose of which is to assist individuals in vocational development. Vocational evaluation incorporates medical, psychological, social, vocational, educational, cultural and economic data into the process to attain the goals of the evaluation (Dowd, 1993). The Commission on Certification of Work Adjustment and Vocational Evaluation Specialists (CCWAVES) has prescribed the following five domains as representative of the knowledge and technical skills that a vocational evaluator needs to enter successfully the profession.
Principles of Vocational Evaluation
- Development and use of situational and community-based assessment
- Concepts of teaching/training/educating/presenting
- Characteristics of work performance and work behavior
- General principles of learning and learning assessment
- Modification and accommodation of evaluation techniques
- Assistive technology devices and services
- Systematic behavioral observation skills and techniques
- Concepts of work adjustment and work hardening
- Service delivery systems common to vocational evaluation
- Community resources and support programs
- Individualized vocational evaluation planning
- Employer and workplace needs and standards
- Program evaluation and research
- General theories of career development and vocational decision-making
- Vocational evaluation philosophy and process
- Adherence to ethical and legal principles/practices of the profession
Standardized Assessment
- Scoring and interpreting standardized tests/instruments
- Selection and administration of standardized tests/instruments
- Statistical concepts related to reliability, validity, and norming of standardized tests/instruments
- Analysis, synthesis and interpretation of evaluation results
- Principles of psychological measurement
- Legal and ethical uses of standardized tests/instruments
- Factors impacting standardized testing
- Triangulation of evaluation techniques
- General concepts of multiple and emotional intelligence(s)
- Use of work samples and commercial vocational evaluation systems
Occupational Information
- Transferable skills analysis
- Standardized occupational information and classification systems
- Labor market research and analysis
- Job analysis and task analysis
- Job development and job placement″ Forensic applications of vocational evaluation
- Common benefit systems
- Computer literacy and application skills, including use of web-based resources to obtain occupation, education, or training information
Implications of Disability
- Psychological/psychiatric aspects of disability
- Pharmacology; impact of medications, substance abuse/abuse/addiction on vocational functioning
- Ecological variables that impact vocational functioning
- Medical aspects of disability″ Psychosocial aspects of disability
- Cultural implications of disability
- Functional skills assessment
Professional Communication
- Verbal communication skills to convey information and evaluation results
- Vocational interviewing skills″ Individualizing and prioritizing recommendations
- Written communication skills and vocational evaluation report development
- Vocational counseling techniques and skills
- Basic negotiation and mediation techniques
- Collaboration skills to develop effective partnerships within and across disciplines
- Principles of case management (CCWAVES, 2006 pp. 17-18)
References
Commission on Certification of Work Adjustment and Vocational Evaluation Specialists (2006). Standards and Procedures Manual for Certification in Vocational Evaluation. Schaumburg, IL: Author. On line available at http://www.ccwaves.org/docs/CVE%20Certification%20Guide_rev523.pdf
Dowd, L. (Ed.) (1993). VEWAA glossary of terminology for vocational assessment, evaluation and work adjustment. Menomonie, WI: Materials Development Center, university of Wisconsin-Stout.
