“It’s all about the standardized language of O*NET information.” Vocational Specialist JR (James) Mooney emphasizes this point often when explaining the many ways he leverages O*NET information to help disabled youth at Mid-Valley Special Education Cooperative in Kane County, Illinois.

Mid-Valley Special Education Coop encompasses five school districts, serves about 800 students, has about 250 students in classrooms and perhaps 80 in transition at community businesses. JR is working with about 10 high schoolers and 15 Elgin Community College students. He enthusiastically shows job coaches, students, parents, employers—and professionals in a couple of dozen services related to vocational evaluation—that O*NET is a treasure trove of standardized language that enables all of them to assess and understand the students, explore occupations, build training plans, write resumés, prepare for interviews, and understand what makes a good job match—for starters!

JR came to Mid-Valley about a year ago, following a career with Chicago Public Schools (CPS) and a few years as a business co-owner with his wife in the building trades. He was trained as a vocational evaluator long ago, using the Talent Assessment Program and APTICOM in the vocational assessment of disabled learners at the CPS. “I related our efforts to the old DOT (Dictionary of Occupational Titles). Of course when O*NET came out, I was enthralled immediately. We could analyze all the occupations within an industry, down to not only specific tasks, but to work styles and then to work values and needs. This was GREAT stuff!”

In helping a professor friend at Roosevelt University (Chicago, IL) conduct studies of hospitality occupations and workers in 2003, JR gained extensive experience manipulating O*NET information and related data to understand what abilities occupations within the industry require, who works those occupations’ jobs successfully, why they are successful, and other vocational puzzles. He came to Mid-Valley keenly aware of how deeply helpful O*NET can be in delivering valuable vocational services. A few examples of ways JR quickly had Mid-Valley using O*NET information:

• We use O*NET’s work context standard language for work environment analysis and job suitability assessment.
• We use O*NET work values and the corresponding work needs standard language for collaborating with students and parents to discern appropriate work setting opportunities for the student.
• We use O*NET’s detailed tasks standard language for task analysis in planning training that is suitable for students.
• We use O*NET’s work styles standard language for determining and then developing the appropriate set of "soft skills" associated with a job in an occupation.
• We use the entire O*NET set of knowledge/skills/abilities standard language for writing outstanding resumés and preparing for successful interviews. These students get the standard language down pat. They know how to explain themselves in language that the HR people expect to hear.

JR explains how the process begins with the college students: “We have the kids do Career Cruising (a career exploration system). There the kids create a resume in their own language, describing work in their own way. Then we have them bump up what they write against O*NET. They learn to use its standard language. All this activity also makes the students aware of their knowledge/skills/abilities.

“They develop the skills they need to be successful in an interview; they practice using that standard language. When kids have an O*NET-based resumé, they work better in an interview. The whole process is guaranteed to be a success.”

Working through work styles and work values information has proven especially helpful when conferring with students and parents. The information in O*NET usually confirms what parents know about their children, and validates in parents’ and students’ minds the authenticity of pursuing particular occupations. Be sure to take in the podcast featuring JR sharing details of how he works with his students—at O*NET Academy (www.onetacademy.com) soon.

In this first year at Mid-Valley, JR has seen kids benefit abundantly from using O*NET. “When students and their parents understand that they have preferences and styles around how and where they work, that they are naturals for some work environments, and not for others, all kinds of light bulbs go off. We have a young lady who quickly realized that she is what I call a “back-of-the-house” person when it comes to work preferences, because she sees herself as an artist, out of the limelight. Using O*NET brought that realization to the fore.

“Similarly, one of our young men, having gone through the processes we use, the battery of assessments, and with O*NET information every step of the way—his own career plans were validated! He now knows he is a “front-of-the-house worker,” a people person. He is so social, so happy to effectively work in the here and now with others. Work with O*NET confirmed his knowledge of his reality. He recently wrote a poem for, and MC-ed at our big celebratory employer breakfast!”

JR is an enthusiastic reader. His current read is Thomas E. Woods, Jr.’s Meltdown: A Free-Market Look at Why the Stock Market collapsed, the Economy Tanked, and Government Bailouts Will Make Things Worse. JR has a reading recommendation for everyone involved in vocational work with young people: “Get a hold of Unfocused Kids: Helping Students To Focus On Their Education And Career Plans: A Resource For Educators by Suzy Mygatt Wakefield (Editor). She has an entire section on using O*NET. This is a tremendous, benchmark book. It should be the handbook for people in education.”