The Partnership: Who We Are and What We Do
Who is the Partnership?
The Partnership for People with Disabilities was founded in 1985 to build a world where all people can live, learn, work, and play together.
We’re based at Virginia Commonwealth University’s School of Education, serving as Virginia’s only University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities or UCEDD.
What is a UCEDD?
(Pronounced “YOU-said.”)
UCEDDs are university-based organizations created to address lack of research, data, training, and best practices to meet the needs of people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD) across the lifespan. President John F. Kennedy signed into law the act that created UCEDDs in 1963, just 22 days before he was assassinated.
What does the Partnership do?
For four decades, the Partnership has been putting research into practice. We provide training, technical assistance, and community services that improve the lives of people with disabilities of all ages and those around them. We employ staff and train volunteers across the Commonwealth while collaborating with community partners locally and nationally.
The Partnership in the Field
Our staff and volunteers are on the ground across Virginia partnering with people with disabilities, amplifying their voices and choices.
In addition to providing families of children of all ages with one on one emotional and informational support , the Center for Family Involvement (CFI) supports people with disabilities and their families who in navigating the transition from subminimum wage to competitive integrated employment through the Real Pay for Real Jobs (RPRJ) EPIC project, in partnership with the Virginia Department for Aging and Rehabilitative Services (DARS).
One family, referred in 2023 after nearly 30 years in a subminimum wage program, faced barriers including no Community Services Board (CSB) involvement, lack of Developmental Disability (DD) Waiver knowledge, no Medicaid application, and caregiver health issues. After almost two years of CFI's family-to-family support, their family member recently received a DD Waiver slot and is now working with the EPIC team to pursue competitive work for the first time. This highlights the impact of targeted family support in overcoming obstacles to competitive integrated employment.
People with IDD are seven times more likely to experience sexual assault and face significantly higher rates of abuse, neglect, and exploitation than their non-disabled peers.
According to the Bureau of Justice Statistics, abuse most often occurs at the hands of someone the victim knows, such as a family member or a paid support provider. To address this crisis, the Partnership developed Leadership for Empowerment and Abuse Prevention (LEAP). This initiative teaches people with IDD and the professionals who support them how to recognize, prevent, and respond to abuse.
The impact of LEAP is profound. During a training session focused on healthy and unhealthy relationships, a woman named Bethany, who lived independently with occasional residential staff support, quietly passed a note to an instructor. It read, “I have a problem with saying no to someone touching me because I’m afraid he’s going to hurt me.” Bethany’s disclosure led to an investigation. The man she referred to as her “boyfriend” was, in fact, a paid support provider who had relocated his family to an apartment complex where he worked, giving him unchecked access to multiple residents. Following Bethany’s report, two additional women and one man came forward, revealing they too had been sexually assaulted by this staff member.
The LEAP training was instrumental in uncovering and stopping a serial perpetrator of sexual violence. Without it, the abuse would have continued unchecked. Continued support and investment in projects like LEAP are critical to protecting the rights, safety, and dignity of people with I/DD. These projects give those most at risk the tools to speak up, be heard, and be safe.
Employment has yet to be considered a realistic outcome for youth IDD and high support needs. Unsurprisingly, the vast majority of people with IDD do not have jobs..
Project PEACE (Promoting Employment After high school through Community Expertise), a project led by the Partnership, engages youth with disabilities, families, educators, administrators, employment service organizations, transition experts, and the Department of Aging and Rehabilitative Services (DARS) to develop solutions to challenge pervasive beliefs about the employment desires and capacities of people with disabilities.
Through a community-developed plan to improve employment outcomes, Richmond middle school students built two successful in-school student-led enterprises, branding, baking and selling cookies and other goodies. Students in intensive support programs from all five Richmond public high schools have accessed work-based learning opportunities at farms, retail businesses, warehouses, and animal shelters. Students were trained to take pictures to document their experiences and reflect on their employment strengths, preferences, and support needs. They captured their experiences in an employment portfolio to share with parents, DARS counselors, and support teams.
Over the last year, six students accessed competitive employment in their communities, 28 registered for Pre-Employment Transition Services, and 20 opened vocational rehabilitation cases to support with ongoing job training. Youth with disabilities want to contribute and when programs like Project PEACE support their preparation, they become reliable, hard-working, tax-paying community members.
The Virginia Deafblind Project strives to support better postsecondary outcomes for deafblind youth through ongoing technical assistance with the interdisciplinary transition team using the Discovering ME (DME) transition assessment process.
During our first conversation with Nevin’s* parents, they were frustrated and had no idea how to move forward with transition planning. Nevin’s mother shared that through using what they learned through DME, they went from having no idea what to do, to knowing how to get to adulthood. Nevin participated in eleven different work-based learning opportunities with his school team, family, area organizations, and community representatives from vocational rehabilitation agencies.
The experience empowered Nevin to take a leadership role in IEP implementation and in DME meetings. At his final meeting, Nevin shared that he will be going to Germanna college after graduation while simultaneously holding a job in a library. He’s considering becoming a librarian.
Most of us know how important early intervention is. The sooner any developmental delays are addressed, the better the outcome for children later in life.
The Partnership is home to the Virginia Early Intervention Professional Development Center or VEIPD. VEIPD develops, maintains, and supports Virginia’s early intervention systems by providing professional training and development and so much more. They even have a podcast highlighting early childhood issues called Meaningful Moments!
One mother shared, “Early intervention has made a great difference in my son’s growth. This program has helped him to communicate his feelings as well as communicate better with others. EI has also helped with his behavior and overall … has been a blessing to me and my son as he is dealing with his diagnosis of autism. My son is now potty trained and using 2 and 3 word phrases. Our therapist Lisa did a wonderful job helping my son get to where he should be by his 3rd birthday. We will be forever grateful for her.”
VTSS is a collection of organizations led by the Virginia Department of Education that implements and sustains a multi-tiered system of supports (MTSS). This work allows schools to provide evidence-based practices and interventions to meet the needs of their students.
One example: Bowling Green Elementary School improved their culture and attendance rate. Bowling Green was able to go from a chronic absenteeism rate of 25% in 2021-22, to a 21% rate for 2022-23. By continuing to refine our practices based data, process,, procedure and structure provided by MTSS , we expect a further decrease in chronic absenteeism over future school years.
Meeting People Where They Are
Staff and volunteers at the Partnership know that in order to have the greatest impact, we need to meet people where they are. We utilize multiple forms of communication to do that. That ranges from in-person meetings, to webinars, to social media to podcasts.
Behind the mic: Erin Croyle of the Center for Family Involvement captures an episode of her monthly podcast, "The Odyssey."
Return on Investment
In 2024, the Partnership received $620,675 in UCEDD core funding. Our team leveraged an additional $18.25 million resulting in approximately $29 returned for every single $1 invested. That is an impressive 2900% rate of return in leveraged funding alone, not including long-term savings or social value.
Here’s what those investments look like on the ground:
- 20,000+ Individuals Trained
Includes people with IDD, families, educators, professionals, and healthcare providers - 2,984 Hours of Technical Assistance Provided
Delivered across education, health, employment, and disability services sectors - 693 Families Received Support
Emotional support, resource navigation, and developmental guidance - 64 Grants/Contracts Secured
- 45 New Products Developed
Training materials, toolkits, curricula, resource guides
Early Childhood
The Partnership's dedication to this work begins even before a child is born. Best practice shows that connecting with and engaging families at the prenatal stage helps to ensure positive outcomes. Our work in this area includes:
- Providing evidence-based emotional support and resource navigation for families of infants, children, youth, and adults with disabilities.
- Supporting early disability diagnosis and intervention for children from birth to three years old.
- Developing and supporting professional opportunities for people working with infants and toddlers with developmental delays, including service coordinators and providers.
- Serving as Virginia’s Ambassador for the Centers for Disease Control’s “Learn the Signs. Act Early.” campaign to help families monitor developmental milestones.
- Providing professional development on compassionate family engagement to educators working with students with disabilities.
- Offering support to Developmental Screening Hubs, partnering with child care providers to spot delays and help caregivers access resources and interventions.
Children and Teens
We provide a wide range of training, technical assistance, and support programs to empower young people and the adults in their lives. Our initiatives include:
- Training family members on Ready Region Family Councils in leadership behaviors to support their role in ensuring quality early care and education programs.
- Providing technical assistance to Local Health Districts on community and family engagement activities.
- Offering training and technical assistance for teachers of students who are deaf, hard of hearing, and deaf-blind, often in partnership with students themselves.
- Providing technical assistance to teachers who work with students with traumatic brain injury.
- Cultivating leadership skills in youth with disabilities to help them develop resources for students, parents, and teachers.
- Supporting school divisions with targeted interventions for students who need extra academic, behavioral, and well-being support.
- Supporting high school transition directors in using virtual asset mapping to connect students with disabilities and parents with employment and service information.
- Providing opportunities for people with IDD and family members to participate alongside college students in an interdisciplinary training program.
Young Adults, Adulthood, and Aging
Our dedication to supporting people with disabilities extends throughout their lifespan. Our programs for young adults, adults, and aging individuals and their families include:
- Partnering with individuals with IDD to train them on health advocacy.
- Training providers on how to offer person-centered practices and positive behavioral supports for people with IDD.
- Collaborating with state agencies to provide training and support for people with IDD and their families to transition from sub-minimum wage activities to competitive integrated employment.
- Working with the Virginia Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services (DBHDS) to collect and analyze outcomes for people with IDD receiving Home and Community-Based Services.
- Employing and training staff and volunteers to support families caring for aging adults with disabilities and/or their aging caregivers, ensuring they have the necessary resources for future care arrangements.
