Arkansas Support Network clients and staff gather in front of Encore Kids: Candia Nicholas, from left, supervisor of vocational programs, Jesse Free, Jennifer Burns, Samantha Porter, Jeff Mitchell, Jordan Cinqmars and Shana Turner, work adjustment training coordinator.
Jeff Mitchell was an avid California surfer who could no longer work construction jobs because of injuries to his back and knees. He knew he needed to re-invent himself.
Mitchell decided to come to Arkansas, where he spent time as a child, and found himself in one of the top-ranked rehabilitation counseling programs in the nation. At the University of Arkansas, he is helping himself and learning to help others.
Initially, Mitchell enrolled at Arkansas State University at Mountain Home to finish an associate’s degree. He heard about the rehabilitation counseling program at the University of Arkansas and came to campus in 2010 to meet with Brent Thomas Williams, associate professor and program coordinator. But, Mitchell needed a bachelor’s degree before he could enter the graduate-level program in Fayetteville so he majored in psychology, finishing the degree last year at the University of Arkansas.
Now, Mitchell divides his time between coursework in the master’s degree program in rehabilitation counseling and an internship that recently turned into a full-time position as a vocational counselor working in the supported employment program at Arkansas Support Network based in Springdale. Later this month, he will take the exam to be a Certified Rehabilitation Counselor.
“I want to help people whether it’s through vocational counseling or mental health counseling,” he said. “I’m especially interested in working with people with substance abuse problems. This is a well-rounded program. It’s an aggregate of everything to do with rehabilitation counseling.”
Changes in the program in recent years give students like Mitchell with varied interests the flexibility to pursue them and the faculty expertise to guide them. The program traditionally focused primarily on vocational rehabilitation to help people with disabilities find meaningful employment. It has broadened its focus to mental health and substance abuse.
A recent ranking of scholarly productivity provided clear evidence that the rehabilitation counseling program is a leader in its field. An article in Rehabilitation Counseling Bulletinreported that the College of Education and Health Professions academic program ranked eighth in the nation for the number of research articles published by faculty in peer-reviewed publications.
RANKINGS
The prestige of academic programs is assessed by faculty research and productivity, according to the article published last month in Rehabilitation Counseling Bulletin. The researchers reviewed seven such publications in the years 200-2009.
“Our rehabilitation counseling program has consistently produced high-quality research that it shares in these publications, and it produces high-quality graduates who are leaders in teaching and serving people with disabilities,” said Tom Smith, dean of the College of Education and Health Professions. “We’re excited to see what the future holds as this program continues the important work of ensuring that people with disabilities have opportunities to work and live as independently as possible.”
The rehabilitation program at Arkansas has been ranked in the top 20 of graduate rehabilitation programs nationally by U.S. News & World Report for more than a decade. It’s currently at No. 16. The article in Rehabilitation Counseling Bulletin found a positive correlation between research productivity of an institution and its U.S. News ranking.
The program has experienced changes in recent years with the retirement of Richard T. Roessler, a teacher, author and researcher considered by many to be a giant in the field. He co-authored the textbook used by academic programs around the country in their introductory rehabilitation courses and won two national awards before his retirement in 2010.
The program has also changed to boast a more diverse faculty that includes two women, one of whom is an African American, and two who have physical disabilities.
“Now, leadership roles in our field are being taken on by people with disabilities and people of different ethnic backgrounds,” said Lynn Koch, professor of rehabilitation education and research. “Often, these people have a better understanding of the challenges faced by people with disabilities because their background gives them more natural empathy.”
ACCESSIBILITY
The program remains small with three faculty members, but it has widened its collaboration with other academic programs in ways that serve both students and faculty.
Williams co-wrote a book with U of A faculty members in architecture and interior design that outlined the concept of universal design to encourage construction of buildings accessible to everyone.
“It’s really nice to work hard to get people training and skills required for jobs but if you can’t get them into the building, I’m not sure what good you’re doing,” Williams said.
The book, called Just Below the Line: Disability, Housing and Equity in the South, was published in 2010 by the University of Arkansas Press. Williams and his co-authors also wrote a chapter for the Universal Design Handbook, a seminal work in the field. The Handbook is used by architecture programs at universities around the nation.
Williams compared the promotion of universal design to convincing people of the increased safety that comes with wearing seat belts in a vehicle.
“I can spend my career trying to pass laws to enforce this or I can educate people so that enforcement is not an issue,” he said. “We can hire more police officers to enforce seat belt laws or we can educate people about safety. I think education is the best way to go.”
“Ultimately, this chapter may very well reach a larger audience than our book,” Williams said of the Universal Design Handbook. “Nineteen and 20-year-olds who will eventually build buildings will read it, and that will have a greater impact.”
MENTAL HEALTH
Koch received a five-year, $500,000 federal grant in 2010 with Kristin Higgins, an associate professor of counselor education, to prepare students to work as psychiatric vocational rehabilitation specialists. The award Koch and Higgins received paid tuition, fees and stipends for 25 master’s students.
Because the delivery of effective psychiatric rehabilitation services requires an interdisciplinary approach, the faculty developed this partnership between the rehabilitation counseling and counselor education academic programs. Along with being able to offer the traineeships to students, the faculty designed a new course and put together a new track within the rehabilitation counseling degree program.
Students such as Mitchell can take additional coursework that makes them eligible to sit for the Licensed Accredited Counselor certification.
Koch and Higgins co-teach a rehabilitation counseling course focusing on the vocational and psychosocial aspects of mental illness. Emphasis is placed on the rehabilitation counselor’s role in collaborating with people with psychiatric disabilities to reduce the stigma associated with mental illness and increase their capacity to achieve their self-determined career and life goals.
Williams currently holds $1.5 million in federal training grants that provide similar tuition and stipends to students who receive training to be general rehabilitation counselors.
SUBSTANCE ABUSE
Stephanie Lusk, who joined the faculty in 2012, concentrates on substance abuse and issues facing families affected by it. Lusk, an assistant professor who previously taught at North Carolina A&T State University, also shares Koch’s passion for studying and teaching about mental health issues.
Lusk earned a doctorate from the U of A program in 2003. She had already received tenure at NC A&T when she got the offer to come back to Fayetteville. She edited a book called Counseling the Addicted Family: Implications for Practitioners published this fall by Aspen Professional Services. Lusk wrote six chapters for the book designed to be used in rehabilitation counseling, clinical mental health, addiction studies and social work courses.
“Addiction doesn’t affect just one individual,” Lusk said. “Everyone around that person is affected. Often, there are co-occurring disorders such as depression.”
Lusk is conducting research internationally and comparing mental health treatment issues in the United States to those in other countries such as Nigeria and Indonesia.
“We are truly ‘Western’ in how we treat addiction here as we are more focused on the medical aspects of this disorder and its negative physiological effects,” she said. “While this is important, we should also ask if there are other modalities of treatment being used elsewhere such as yoga, acupuncture, meditation, that can be incorporated so that individuals experience a more holistic course of treatment. This is what I am hoping to learn.”
INTERNSHIPS
Students gain valuable experience doing practicums and internships at local agencies. Internships require a student to complete 600 hours with an agency, Lusk said, and all faculty members supervise students during their internships, which also serve as an exchange of information and experiences.
“Internships solidify what we’re doing in class,” she said. “We teach theory and then students apply this theory; they get to see how it works in the real world. Students bring information and questions back to class, and that helps us all keep learning.”
At Arkansas Support Network, Mitchell started out his internship working part of the day with clients in the supported employment program called Workbridge, which is a partnership between ASN and Arkansas Rehabilitation Services. Clients with intellectual disabilities, including autism spectrum disorders, and physical disabilities learn how to write resumes, develop their interview skills, to dress appropriately and to apply for jobs. Clients must be referred to the program by Arkansas Rehabilitation Services, said Shana Turner, the work adjustment training coordinator.
In the afternoon, Mitchell helped to supervise clients as they perform various tasks at Encore Kids, a children’s clothing resale shop in Springdale. The work helps prepare them for entry-level jobs in the service and retail industries.
“It all ties in to quality of life,” Mitchell said. “For most people, if they don’t have a job, it’s reasonably likely they will be miserable. We all know that.”
Advocacy for the clients and educating employers is an important part of the work Mitchell and others at Arkansas Support Network do.
“Some employers are skeptical about hiring someone with a disability,” Mitchell said. “That’s often based on a lack of information.”
SHARED SUCCESSES
The program’s strong emphasis on research is aided by the college’s faculty in the educational statistics and research methods, Koch said. Rehabilitation counseling students take 15 to 18 hours of statistics courses before graduating, and the statistics faculty members sit on dissertation committees in rehabilitation.
“Our success is about the success of the entire college,” Koch said. “And, we also collaborate with faculty at other universities.”
The graduate students in the program represent diversity of backgrounds, ethnicities and professional interests. Most have direct or family experience with disabilities, Williams said.
“There is a strong tie between poverty and disabilities,” he said. “Disabilities are more prevalent in marginalized populations. If you don’t have people in these groups represented in the service sector, you’re probably going to have problems connecting with them.”
The faculty members give the students freedom to explore the subjects that interest them and to use their personal, educational and career backgrounds as a strength.
“The students who come into the program want to work in different areas such as substance abuse and autism, and we are able to tailor our research projects to our personal interests,” Mitchell said. “A couple of veterans did papers on post-traumatic stress disorder. Everyone found their own niche based on what brought them into the program. Professors didn’t tell us what we had to do.”
The program does a good job of preparing students for leadership positions, faculty said, and its alumni illustrate its success. They teach at leading rehabilitation counseling programs at other institutions and are practitioners in leadership roles at human-service agencies. Graduates serve as directors and associate directors of several of the primary human-service agencies in Northwest Arkansas, including Arkansas Support Network, Sources for Community Independent Living Services, Elizabeth Richardson Center and the regional office of Arkansas Rehabilitation Services.
Phillip Rumrill, who earned his doctorate in rehabilitation counseling at Arkansas in 1993, coordinates the rehabilitation counseling program and directs the Center for Disability Studies at Kent State University in Ohio. He is also the founding director of the Multiple Sclerosis Employment Assistance Service, and the College of Education and Health Professions selected him as the winner of its Outstanding Alumni Award in Health and Human Services in 2011.
