Hands On @ Hyatt – A Public-Private Partnership That Works

John Ficca is being honored as a Disability Employment Champion of Change.

As the Director of Hands On Education, it is an honor to accept this recognition on behalf of our program and our partners—Hyatt Hotels and State Vocational Rehabilitation agencies funded by the U.S. Department of Education. I owe the program’s success to a unique public-private partnership and to our focus on the individuals that we serve.

Hands On @ Hyatt is a state-funded training program that prepares individuals with disabilities for employment in the hospitality industry. Our students are paid employees of Hyatt and learn from some of the best chefs and managers in the industry.  Graduates leave with increased confidence, employability skills, a certificate of completion, and the ability to use Hyatt as a recent employment reference.

The program began in 1998 at the Grand Hyatt in Tampa Bay. The Florida State Division of Vocational Rehabilitation (DVR) took a chance and funded the program on a fee-for-service basis. DVR’s mission is to help individuals with disabilities get a job, keep a job, or return to work. Our challenge, then, was to prove that people with disabilities could be successfully employed in this work environment. The first summer of our program was incredible—all of our students obtained employment.

Our Hyatt partners began asking why we just trained in the kitchen. “Why not other departments? Why are we just training at one Hyatt Hotel? Why not Orlando and Miami?” 16 years later, Hands On @ Hyatt is operating in 32 Hyatt Hotels in states all across the country.

Thanks to the Council of State Administrators of Vocational Rehabilitation (CSAVR), our expansion has been a relatively easy process. CSAVR is a professional organization made up of VR Directors in all 50 states, Washington, D.C., and the territories.  This includes the Directors of the vocational rehabilitation agencies that serve individuals who are visually impaired. CSAVR sponsors the National Employment Team, and they have been extremely involved with every new Hands On @ Hyatt location. Also, local school districts have helped us identify youth who could benefit from this type of training.

To date, the partnership has trained over 1,500 individuals with disabilities and observed above average post-training employment outcomes. It is with great pride that I accept this award on behalf of our program, our partners, and the individuals that we serve.

John Ficca is the founder and Program Director of Hands On Educational Services, Inc.

Disability Is My Strength

Jenny Lay-Flurrie is being honored as a Disability Employment Champion of Change.

As a person with a disability who is passionate about enabling others with disabilities, I am humbled and honoured to be a White House Champion of Change.

My journey with disability started early. By the age of 5, my hearing was already declining, a process that would continue over the next 30+ years. As a teenager and even through most of my twenties, I felt that I needed to hide my disability. My hearing loss is now profound, but by asking for the help I need and seeing my disability as a strength, I have been able to make myself – and now my employer – stronger. I am fortunate to work for a company that empowers and enables people to be successful.  I wake up excited every morning, eager to get to work. I’m lucky to be in a position to make a difference, and this fact drives me to do more every day.

I am a Senior Director at Microsoft, leading the Trusted Experience Team (TExT), which focuses on privacy, online safety, and accessibility. Our goal is to provide a positive experience for all customers. As with any great journey, mine started by taking big terrifying steps. The first was to identify to Microsoft as a person with a disability.  I joined the deaf ‘huddle’ group at Microsoft and went on to create and lead the DisAbility Employee Resource Group (ERG), a community of amazing people with disabilities, advocates, colleagues, and parents who share best practices and elevate understanding. At our first annual ‘Ability Summit’ four years ago, 80 people showed up. This past spring, 800 people came to Redmond headquarters to spend the day, which featured our CEO Satya Nadella, Washington Governor Jay Inslee, and many others. The theme of the summit was “Imagine, Build, Enable,” and we have taken that to heart at Microsoft.

In 2012, we announced the Disability Answer Desk (DAD), providing specialized support for customers with disabilities. Today, DAD helps about 4,000 customers a month do more with Microsoft products and services. The team is made up of talented people both with and without disabilities. In addition, I work with the Washington State Disability Taskforce, a public-private group focused on driving representation of people with disabilities in state government to at least 5%. Lastly, I sit on the US Business Leadership Network (USBLN) board of directors, which works towards disability inclusion in the workplace. It’s more “than just doing the right thing;” it’s about enabling people to be successful and achieve their dreams. It’s about changing lives, just as mine was changed. 

At Microsoft, we are imagining and building technology for people with disabilities. During our company-wide ‘Hackathon’, we had projects focused on improving technology for people with deafness, blindness, autism, and more. Out of nearly three thousand submitted “hacks,” six of these projects placed in the top 100.  I’m most proud of our work with former NFL player Steve Gleason, who is living with ALS, to help create prototype technology to independently move a wheelchair via eye tracking. This work won the 2014 Microsoft Hackathon Grand Prize!

My disability motivates me to strive for a higher bar—a new level of independence and empowerment. It helps me to understand and have empathy for our customers.  I work to drive this understanding into Microsoft to create better products. So go on, if you want to know more about your customers, take that step and hire a person with a disability. They’ll teach you all you need to know.

Jenny Lay-Flurrie is a Senior Director at Microsoft, leading the Trusted Experience Team (TExT).

Protecting the San Gabriel Mountains for Future Generations

This op-ed by President Obama was published in Spanish on La Opinión. You can read the original op-ed in Spanish HERE. 

One hundred and fifty years ago, President Lincoln signed a law that forever changed the way we conserve our natural heritage.  It might have seemed an odd thing to do at the time.  We were in the middle of the Civil War.  The fate of our union hung in the balance.  Lincoln himself had never even been to California; for a good part of his life, his home state of Illinois was the West. 

But descriptions, drawings, and even some early photographs of the Yosemite Valley had made their way back East – as had stories about encroaching development that threatened the area.  So President Lincoln decided to help protect a place he had never visited, for a nation he might not be able to save.  In the darkest of days, he decided to bet on a future he would never live to see.  And because he did, generations of Americans have known the wonders of Yosemite National Park.

That’s why, last week, I visited California to designate the San Gabriel Mountains a National Monument.  This action will permanently protect more than 346,000 acres of rugged slopes and remote canyons that are home to an extraordinary diversity of wildlife and attract more than three million visitors every year – more than icons like Mount Rushmore and Grand Teton National Park.

What’s more, the San Gabriel Mountains contain millennia of history, from the ancient rock art of Native Americans to the Mount Wilson Observatory where Edwin P. Hubble showed the universe to be ever-expanding – and where astronomers explore the mysteries of space today.

In many ways, the story of the San Gabriel Mountains is the story of America. It’s the story of communities living in the great west – of Native Americans and Spanish missionaries, of colonialists and rancheros, of merchants and landowners. It’s the story of prospectors in search of gold; of settlers in search of a new life.

That story continues today – and it’s being written by one of our nation’s most vibrant, diverse communities, in the backyard of the second-biggest city in the country.  Over fifteen million people live within 90 minutes of the San Gabriel Mountains.  The mountains provide residents with roughly 30 percent of their water and 70 percent of their open space.  The whole area is a huge boost to the local economy.

In fact, we heard from the community that for a lot of urban families, the San Gabriels are their only big, outdoor space.  Too many children in L.A. County, especially Latinos and children of color, don’t have access to parks where they can run free, breathe fresh air, experience nature, and learn about their own environment.

It’s not enough to have that awesome natural wonder within sight.  Everybody, no matter where they come from, or how much money they have, or what language they speak, should be able to access and experience it. Right now, campgrounds are crowded, parking lots are tight, and there haven’t been enough resources to manage and maintain this area the way it deserves. Designating the San Gabriel Mountains as a National Monument was just the first step in a broader effort to change that. It will enable the Forest Service, local communities, and leading philanthropies to work together to increase access and outdoor opportunities for all. 

Because America belongs to all of us.  That’s why, as President, I’ve preserved more than three million acres of public lands for future generations, and I’m not finished. My commitment to conservation isn’t about locking away our national treasures. It’s about working with communities to open our glorious heritage of nature to all Americans.

The San Gabriel Mountains National Monument will join a vast landscape of protected natural treasures – a wilderness that the writer Wallace Stegner once called, “a part of the geography of hope.”  As Americans, we’re blessed with the most beautiful landscapes in the world.  And we’re bestowed with the responsibility to preserve our magnificent natural inheritance, and ensure that this “geography of hope” remains the birthright of all Americans – not only for today, but for generations to come.