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Encore: Project SEARCH Helps Students with Disabilities Transition from School to Work

Project SEARCH Interns
Lee Health
Project SEARCH Interns

We’re learning about Project SEARCH which helps students with intellectual and developmental disabilities transition from school to work. The one-year program’s primary objective is to help recent grads develop life and work skills appropriate for competitive employment. Project SEARCH was first developed 20 years ago at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, and is now at more than 300 sites across the U.S. and around the world, including here in Southwest Florida at HealthPark Medical Center, and Golisano Children’s Hospital of Southwest Florida.

We’re joined by Meghan Daley, Project SEARCH Program Coordinator for Lee Health; Colleen Tenfelde, Project SEARCH Teacher from The School District of Lee County Exceptional Student Education Department; Ethan Rodriguez, Project SEARCH Intern; and Renee Sluzalis, Regional Director of the Center for Independent Living Gulf Coast.

Copyright 2019 WGCU

Julie Glenn is the host of Gulf Coast Live. She has been working in southwest Florida as a freelance writer since 2007, most recently as a regular columnist for the Naples Daily News. She began her broadcasting career in 1993 as a reporter/anchor/producer for a local CBS affiliate in Quincy, Illinois. After also working for the NBC affiliate, she decided to move to Parma, Italy where she earned her Master’s degree in communication from the University of Gastronomic Sciences. Her undergraduate degree in Mass Communication is from the University of Missouri at Kansas City.
Mike Kiniry is producer of Gulf Coast Live, and co-creator and host of the WGCU podcast Three Song Stories: Biography Through Music. He first joined the WGCU team in the summer of 2003 as an intern while studying Communication at Florida Gulf Coast University.