By Jamel Berry
When I was in high school, I was advised to contact New York State’s Adult Career and Continuing Education Services — Vocational Rehabilitation (ACCES-VR) for job training. However, I wasn’t traveling on my own yet, because even though I was 20 years old at the time, I relied on the school bus to get around during all my years of school.
No one taught me how to travel around New York City on my own. I wanted to learn. The ACCES-VR team told me about INCLUDEnyc, which is how I joined the Project Possibility program. INCLUDEnyc’s Project Possibility provides intensive support for youth with disabilities like me who are transitioning into adult life
When I started at INCLUDEnyc, I worked with a youth educator who helped me through some assessments. She asked me questions. The educator wanted to see how much I knew about traveling around New York City. Then, we worked on learning those skills one step at a time.
First, we practiced traveling from my apartment in Harlem to the INCLUDEnyc office in Union Square. Then, I attended an INCLUDEnyc program workshop called “Traveling Around NYC.” The workshop was a citywide scavenger hunt. We were [...]