Intervention Specialist - Project SEARCH

Minimum Qualifications:

• Valid Ohio Special Education Teaching Certificate/License to teach children with disabilities.
• Transition to Work Endorsement
• Documentation of a clear criminal record.
• Complies with drug-free workplace rules and board policies.

FLSA Classification: Exempt

Reports To: Director of Student Services and Coordinator of Special Education.

Job Objectives:
The goal of Project SEARCH is to prepare young people with significant disabilities for success in integrated, competitive employment. The Project SEARCH instructor works with students, families, and community partners to identify student's strengths, interests and abilities related to the acquisition of skills essential for successful competitive employment. The instructor develops internship and community job sites consistent with student's interests and skills, refers to and/or works with appropriate community support services, coordinates program staff, assesses student performance and identifies modifications/accommodations or behavioral strategies to mitigate barriers to employment. The business partner and location for this Project SEARCH is the Big Lots Behavioral Pavilion at Nationwide Children's Hospital.

Responsibilities and Essential Functions:
“The following duties are representative of performance expectations, however the list below is not ranked in order of importance or intended to be all inclusive.”

• Provides a transition to employment program for students as defined by the student’s Individualized Education Plan (IEP).
• Works cooperatively with outside agencies, such as OOD and the Board of Developmental Disabilities, and the Center for Autism Spectrum Disorders at Nationwide Children’s Hospital to connect students with appropriate community based services.
• Identifies and develops internship sites within the host business for students to marketable, competitive skills that lead to competitive employment, uses universal design to make accommodations and adaptations to work sites, perform specific job/task analysis and job matching activities.
• Utilizes appropriate assessment, data collection and progress monitoring methods to inform progress on skills acquisition, work quality, productivity and independence.
• Meets with students, families and agency personnel to determine career interests, job preferences (hours, location, etc.), skills and abilities to develop to increase employability (communication, problem solving, teamwork, grooming, budgeting, self-advocacy, travel training, etc.).
• Collaborates in the coordination of the program staff; coordinates Steering Committee Meetings, internal job placement opportunities, placement of skills trainers; communicates with business liaison, etc.
• Assists students in the development of work portfolios that include credentialing of skills attained, letter of recommendation from internship sites, etc.
• Seeks professional growth and learning opportunities to advance knowledge and skills.
• Complies with Federal and state model policies and procedures for the education of students with disabilities, completes all required reports and record keeping in accordance with timelines and deadlines, maintains confidentiality, reports to child protective services as mandated.
• Implements effective strategies to address behavioral or other concerns that interfere with gaining and maintaining employment.
• Upholds board policies, follows administrative guidelines, complies with Federal and state laws, model policies and procedures, rules and regulations for the education of students with disabilities. Ensures paperwork is accurate, all timelines and deadlines are met (annual reviews, progress reports, etc.), strictly adheres to HIPPA and FERPA, respects personal privacy and maintains confidentiality of privileged information.
• Maintains high ethical standards, exhibits professionalism, self-control, flexibility, satisfactory attendance/punctuality, dependability, accepts responsibility for decisions and conduct, promotes a favorable image of the Agency, etc.).
• Adapts to unique circumstances and factors such as travel, extended hours, student behaviors, lifting/transferring students, transport students using Agency vans, etc.
• Adapts individual and cultural differences.
• Completes other duties as assigned by the Superintendent or his/her designee.

“Job performance is evaluated according to the policy provisions adopted by the Governing Board of the Educational Service Center of Central Ohio.

Conduct:
Each staff member shall remain free of any alcohol or non-prescribed controlled substance and abuse of any prescribed controlled substance in the workplace throughout his/her employment in the Agency.

Terms of Employment:

Each staff member shall serve as a role model for students in how to conduct themselves as citizens and as responsible, intelligent human beings. Each staff member has a legal responsibility to help instill in students the belief in and practice of ethical principles and democratic values.

It is the employee's responsibility to maintain proper certification/licensure and to initiate the renewal process in sufficient time to receive the updated certificate/license prior to the expiration of the present certificate/license.

Job descriptions are designed and intended only to summarize the essential duties, responsibilities, qualifications and requirements for the purpose of clarifying the general nature and scope of the position’s role as part of the overall organization. Job Descriptions do not list all of the tasks an employee might be expected to perform and they do not limit the right of the employer/supervisor to assign additional tasks or otherwise modify duties as performed. Every employee has a duty to perform all assigned tasks. It should also be noted that the order of performance responsibilities as listed in not designed or intended to rank duties in any order of importance relative to each other.

Application Procedure:
Please complete the employment application through www.escco.org.

Job ID 21680

February 2025