Under the cherry-pink glow announcing spring’s arrival in Washington, DC and the Metro area I reflect how far individuals with disabilities have come: moving from denial of education services to the federal guarantee of equal access in public school and college. Changes in the field continue and we are pleased that we are able to share with you those reforms efforts. Research by Eve Müller and Paula Burdette of Project Forum at the National State Directors of Special Education, Inc. (NASDSE) describes high school reform in three states and efforts to include special education in the high school reform process at both state and local levels.

To help high school graduates plan for their college experience HEATH brings you the PDF version of Wisconsin's recently published (September 2007) handbook, "Opening Doors to Postsecondary Education: Planning for Life After High School."

Individuals with disabilities often find benefits received from Social Security Administration (SSA) provide added financial support to access college and career goals. For some it seems that just getting through the paperwork and financial formulas requires a specialized college degree. However, Roger Shelley, Marsha Katz and David Hammis reassure us "it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand and use Social Security Work Incentives. And these Work Incentives can dramatically improve the lives of people with disabilities!" We encourage you to read their informative training manual that includes a basic overview of Work Incentives and their parent programs to help you decipher the SSA forms and regulations.

The HEATH website provides added information about social security benefits and programs in our LINKS pages under the topic: Social Security and Supplemental Security Income. We also invite you to visit our FAQ pages to learn of other ways to fund your college or help you in your career, and find answers to many other questions.

Our Project Investigator recently challenged students in her Special Education Course: 236, Introduction to Career, Vocational and Transition Services, The George Washington University, Graduate School of Education & Human Development to select websites they considered their favorite transition websites. We present them here for your use as well.

As we anticipate the transition to spring’s full burst of color and the eventual warm glow of summer, HEATH knows you will soon be preparing for your own transition from high school to postsecondary education. To help with that transition HEATH once again provides you a listing of Summer Pre-College Programs for youth investigating the prospects of college and postsecondary education.

Stay connected with HEATH whatever the season! We encourage you to subscribe to our website pages using our RSS Feed service. For those of you wishing an accessible RSS Feed Reader you may find downloading WebbIE useful: http://www.webbie.org.uk/accessiblerss/index.htm.

And of course, we invite you to be a frequent visitor at www.HEATH.gwu.edu!

All the best,
Donna Martinez
Director, The GW HEATH Resource Center

The crisp nip in the air and the leaves whipping in the breeze indicates that fall is well upon us. We at HEATH look forward to celebrating Thanksgiving with family and friends. I’d like to take this opportunity to personally thank you, our readership, for your interest and continued support in The GW HEATH Resource Center. We appreciate you spending time with us here on our website. Thank you all for your calls, emails, and most of all your participation in our survey.

We send a great big thank you to our contributors and those who have granted us permission to republish/redistribute their material this quarter. We appreciate all the manuscripts and resources sent to us and are pleased to share them here on our website. We also thank those of you who have generously distributed our HEATH information(e.g. HEATH brochures and publications ) at your events!

We also wish to thank Lumina Foundation for Education, an Indianapolis-based, private, independent foundation dedicated to expanding success in education beyond high school, for their continued support and funding of HEATH. HEATH is pleased to announce The Fall 2007 edition of Lumina Foundation’s Focus: Campus connections, ‘Near-peer' mentoring, and other innovative efforts help widen the college track. In this issue, you’ll find front-line stories to increase college access and success, a cause very dear to our hearts and that of our readership. To learn more, we invite you to visit Lumina Foundation’s website (www.luminafoundation.org) and download your PDF copy at: http://tinyurl.com/2j7ndp

HEATH continues to encourage you to subscribe to our website pages using our RSS Feed service. For those of you wishing an accessible RSS Feed Reader you may find downloading WebbIE useful: http://www.webbie.org.uk/accessiblerss/index.htm.

With turkey wishbone gripped firmly in hand, I wish you all postsecondary access and success!

Donna Martinez
Director, The GW HEATH Resource Center

Dear Friends,
With the summer on the wane we look back at our accomplishments made so far. With the click of the bright orange RSS Feed Button, The HEATH Online Clearinghouse brings you immediate updates of the many additions to our site. We’ve kept you abreast on announcements of scholarships, internships and/or fellowships, developments in postsecondary education and career developments for students with disabilities. Our Links continue to grow with the addition of new discoveries. We have added more information in our FAQs section based on your calls and emails to AskHEATH. And we look forward to you answering our call for publications.

Dear Friends of HEATH Resource Center,
It is with great enthusiasm that I introduce myself to you. I am Donna Martinez; the new Director of The HEATH Resource Center supported in part by Lumina Foundation for Education, an Indianapolis-based, private, independent foundation dedicated to expanding success in education beyond high school. I assumed the role of Director January 2007 when long-time Director, Dr. Pam Ekpone successfully completed projects funded by Office of Special Education Programs. Supporting Dr. Ekpone was her capable staff, Assistant Director, Zavolia Willis; Editor, Daniel Gardner; Dr. Michael Ward, Researcher; and Webmaster, Nasra Abdu. Under Dr. Ekpone’s excellent leadership, The HEATH Resource Center Team provided a wealth of information in its publications and direct personalized responses to telephone and AskHEATH email queries. I offer them my heartfelt thanks for extending me the same support during this transition period. Please join me in wishing the HEATH Team “Best of Luck!” as they leave their positions to embrace other possibilities. I look forward to serving you and continuing the standard of excellence they established.

HEATH is pleased to announce our 2007 edition of Creating Options: Financial Aid for Individuals with Disabilities is completely updated and revised to provide information to help individuals with disabilities in their quest of financial assistance for postsecondary education.