We Not Me: Jason Crippen
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Okay, friends, welcome to another episode of the We Not Me Inclusion in Action Podcast. I am really excited today to welcome our friend Jason Crippen. Jason was nominated by, my friend Brian Wilson. Brian was our first guest on the podcast. So, I love Brian and, am honored that he, chose Jason, and this is actually our second recording because we had some [00:01:00] technical difficulties. So, Jason, would you mind introducing yourself a little bit? Sure. Well, I appreciate those, kind words and I appreciate Brian for wanting me to come on and do this.
I've known Brian for a while and we both kind of have the same passion for the SPED community, so I really, talk to him quite a bit. But anyway, my name is Jason and I do lots of things. I am a transition coordinator for the Goddard Public Schools. I've. Taught mixed abilities for just over 20 years in the Wichita area.
I really love our community and I also run a business where I, help people who have disabilities find jobs, and it's called What's Next. I opted on the Smurf shirt instead of my business shirt because, it's summer. I love the bright colors and the festive shirts.
So that's one of the things that Brian and I always talk about whenever I talk to Brian is, meaningful employment. And so when he mentioned your name and your business, I knew that was something that we definitely had to [00:02:00] talk about. I'm curious what drew you to working into the field of finding meaningful employment for people with disabilities initially?
That's a good question because honestly, I taught for many years and I was just happy with that. I felt like I was doing an okay job. Kids were learning and there's just a big gap. I was at Chisholm for a few years when Brian was there and, I ended up, going back to my spot at East after that I could see the end when I went to Chisholm and I never really saw the end as much before. I really wanted to help get my kids jobs. I was kind of doing that, for free but I was just helping my seniors get connected before they left.
And if things are going well, I find some good connections good fits and my wife started talking to me about, you know, trying out the whole business thing, finding kids jobs, and I, you know, nervous [00:03:00] 'cause I have three kids gotta get pay for those things. So, she told me it was gonna be fine and, you know, prayed about it a little bit just decided to take a leap.
And here we're about three years later and still rocking it. And so now I'm able to like, fill that gap and I'm finding myself teaching. It's just a different way. Mm-hmm. Like, I called somebody at seven 30 this morning to talk about his interviews prep type things, and he kept saying, you know, you know, you know, in between every word.
And I go. I've never met him before in my life either. I've just talked to him on the phone once and I said, okay, you said, you know, four times already, let's take a breath in between. And he's like, okay, I could do this. So cool. But yeah, so anyway that's kind of what drew me to this.
I really like to be out and about and this job is out and about. I don't really count it. I don't really call it a job either. I hate it when I say job 'cause it's not really a job. This is kind of a hobby yet [00:04:00] career at the same time. I think that we are kindred spirits. That's one of the reasons I wanted to do the podcast because one of my favorite things is, being able to be out and about and talking to people all over the place about what they do and what I.
What they're passionate about. And I think it's so interesting to share people's passions and what exciting work they're doing. And the work that you're doing is so important. So, I've been on the, Kansas Employment First Oversight Commission for a number of years, and the work that you're doing is something that we're looking at as a systemic level.
It is really challenging systemically to find employment for people with disabilities. And so that's something that we're trying to address. And one of the things that we look at is, common misconceptions that employers have about hiring people with disabilities. So from your experience what are some of those common misconceptions and how do you address those?
I mean, [00:05:00] honestly, the biggest one is. Employers or individuals, they feel like it's gonna be hard. When you go in, you talk about, disabilities where I say I run a disability employment service. Sometimes there's a look or an eyebrow rate, you know, just something like that.
And I, it is not harder, it's just different. And that's my biggest thing to say is. You're getting an employee that is gonna be there, they're dependable. It's gonna take maybe a little more training at the front end, a little more patience to make sure you got it. Once it's there, it's there.
And so I, I just, I am a big, I harp on that, that it's not harder, it's different. And we need to take that verbiage out so we can help more people. You know, we don't all wanna be. Stuck. We don't all wanna be in the house. We wanna be out. And so we've gotta find [00:06:00] ways to get everybody, everybody moving.
You know, there's agencies that have it figured out and that are doing it really, really well. My son, who is, 21 and usually pops in during a podcast recording happens to be at school right now. He works for the KC current and they have got an amazing hiring an onboarding program, that is inclusive for everybody.
Once Employers, I think, have a system figured out that's inclusive. It's easy to replicate and model. It's just getting past that barrier. Would you agree? I would agree. Yeah. It's when I'm out there hunting, there's lots of places that are hiring. There's just tons. But what it.
Takes is finding the fit, finding where this person wants to be, and maybe even if they want to be some place, it might not be the best fit for them, even though that's what they've said. So trying to feel it out. I mean, sometimes I'll just go in places and sit and [00:07:00] watch. Again, beauty of. Getting to do this, it's, I can go sit somewhere and just watch how the employees interact with each other, how the management interacts with their employees, how the people interact with employee.
You know, there's lots of things in there. So it's fun to be able to try to navigate that. That's where the, I feel like the teaching also comes in as I can look at what training or what things I need to tell my clients in order to get them. In that door. So you're kind of doing a task analysis on the job site, is that
yeah. Or a spy, if we just wanna one word it, that works too. So are there any, barriers that from the job seekers perspective, that you think would be surprising to people who are not in the disability field? They don't understand how low some of our guys' confidence is. And I don't want that to sound negative, but it's just they've either been told forever [00:08:00] it's not gonna work, or they've been told I can only do this.
And so trying to get them out of their shells is a challenge. I was at an interview last week with a client sometimes I get a little over talky and when they're talking and I'm answering questions and I'm trying to like problem solve in the moment and they have an idea. And so we start talking and all of a sudden here's the dude sitting over here and I'm like, Hey, I'm sorry you wanna jump in here 'cause I'm literally just talking this whole time.
And you know, they don't quite know what to say.. And they don't wanna say the wrong thing. Kinda like, we all don't wanna say the wrong thing, for them. Saying the wrong thing is life shattering. And so right where we can like say something dumb and then we kind of retool and talk more until we fix it.
For somebody who has disability, if they say it, it's out there, oh crap, I'm done. And that's it. Yeah. Yeah. I know in the school system, you know, if there's a quote [00:09:00] unquote behavior that somebody with a disability has had, it often gets written in the IEP. When if somebody without a disability were to do the same thing, it was just a bad day.
There tends to be. Perhaps less forgiveness for people with, with disabilities sometimes. I like that you raised that, that level of awareness. 'cause I think that's really important to bring that up. That we're all people and we need to, we need to remember that. I think everyone loves to hear a success story.
Can you share a success story that highlights an innovative strategy or creative approach that you've used to help someone find employment? Honestly, I have a young lady that I helped just last, well, a couple weeks ago, find a job. She was one of my former summer school students, years and years ago.
She was one of my wife's students at North High, but she, just graduated to 21 and she is trying to find something and she's so fun and just a , little cute girl [00:10:00] down syndrome and trying to help her get out there and you know, can be a little stubborn. But, I went into this place in her area 'cause I knew it'd be easy for her to get there and I just said.
Hey. And I had a picture of her on my phone and I said, check out this girl. She really needs a job. Here's what she could do. She is fantastic. And then, we brought her in and now she has a job. And so it was super, super fast. That went really quick.
There's. So many success stories, and I don't want that to sound like, pat on the back type thing, but nothing makes me happier than when I go somewhere or I drive by someplace and I'm like, there's someone there, you know? And I'm finding that's happening more and more and it's really exciting.
Well, I think you deserve that, pat on the back. So here's your virtual pat on the back. Well, I appreciate that, but it feels. Weird sometimes still,, and 'cause obviously now that I am pseudo in the [00:11:00] business world doing this, I have to keep this going. I have to talk about things and I have to bring these things up and that's just not.
Usually how I roll. , I talk about this when I do admin training. When we're little kids, we're so excited to share, you know, amazing celebrations. Look what I did. It's so exciting, right? As we get older we're less excited to share accomplishments that we've had and that's a weird thing that happens in society, you are doing incredible work and you're doing incredible work for people who need your supports and services. So, share those stories. That's incredible. Thank you for doing that. So how do you partner with businesses to create genuine, inclusive workplaces that are mutually beneficial?
What does that partnership look like? Really, it's just communication. I will go in just off the street. And talk to places. I did this in my teaching career too, is I hated doing canned things, you know, and I taught mixed abilities, so I [00:12:00] was, we're not just grabbing the book and reading it, so I always made my own stuff and I could have found a lot of stuff elsewhere, but I just felt like this is my job to.
Figure this out. And I kind of do the same thing with this. I don't like to repeat, even though I know I'm gonna have to repeat because there's only so many jobs around. But I just really go into places and talk to 'em. And I use some of my , connections that I have around the area. 'cause I've done this for a long time.
And so it's, it's just a, Hey, do you know anybody like this? And then I talk to 'em and, you know, after we start talking. And sometimes it doesn't work. And I tell 'em, this, if it doesn't work, it doesn't work. If it does, we're great and we're gonna give it the best shot that we got.
'cause like, the rest of us, sometimes things don't work in our jobs or our careers. So it is perfectly okay to know when we've hit a wall, [00:13:00] but a lot of times. We haven't hit a wall. And even in, sometimes when I have had somebody who doesn't work there anymore, I still have a relationship with that business.
I'll go in and talk to 'em randomly if I'm in there, or I'll just send 'em a text, say, Hey, I drove by the other day and thinking about you guys. How are you doing? Mm-hmm. Just to keep it going. It is not even about what you could do for me. That is not the thing.
I just like to talk to people and like to make sure everybody's. So just that communication is, is huge. Yeah. I like how you brought up, , it's okay to decide that job ne wasn't necessarily a good fit and that's okay. I also think it's okay to acknowledge that people with disabilities also deserve a career ladder.
We also need to talk to people with disabilities about how can you build on these skills and how can you grow from here? We don't need to just have job placement and then done. [00:14:00] And I know that you talk to people about that as well, but I think that's, I think that's an important awareness to bring too.
Sometimes that's hard because you have people that have an idea, full-time benefits. This is what I want. That is a fantastic goal. That's Grand. I like it. However, it's hard to just go and jump in full-time. Especially when you're trying to beat this barrier down, down here. And what I tell people is, if you can get in there part-time, show what you can do and do it, and , really put in the work, it's gonna grow.
And sometimes that's hard for me to get across to some of my clients. You know, they get it and I understand and I don't want to shortchange their dreams, and that's not what I do. But we have to look at how it goes. Or if someone's not getting enough hours right now. I say, you have to play the long game.
You have to show what you can do. You can't be there for a month. That's not gonna work. Sometimes not even three months is enough time. You know, you really [00:15:00] have to show you cut your teeth, so to speak, and that's hard to get sometimes across. Yeah, and that's where again, that I, my new teaching gig comes from, I suppose, is just saying, I know it's not great right now, but do it.
You've got it. Or you've been there a week and you feel like, I should be fine, I should be good. I got this. You're still learning. Take time. Take time. Go slow. You've, you got nothing but time to do this. So from your perspective, how does competitive integrated employment impact the overall quality of life and independence for individuals with disabilities?
Sounds like you're giving me an employment first buzz buzzword vocabulary. I mean, maybe, and I didn't even, I haven't even dropped that. This was the topic of my dissertation, so I'm just gonna let you take this one. No, you're fine. Okay, so the question was how does it improve their life? I mean, honestly, it improves it greatly.
[00:16:00] You and me both know if we, even though we're really busy right now, busy people, so if we had, let's say, two weeks of sitting in our house, just being in the basement, okay, that'd be fine. But we would want to get out, we would want to be doing something else eventually. And that's, we are afforded that, right?
And everyone else needs to be afforded that right, too. Mm-hmm. So the fact that getting. People out in the community integrated. Is huge. I teach a course on Saturday's Intro to Exceptionalities at WSU for the transition to teaching program. So a bunch of new teachers haven't started yet, and so I try to give them some, hopefully knowledge about.
What's coming, what you're looking for, how to tackle certain things. And you know, one of them is inclusion and we've gotta give it the best shot that we can. Is it gonna be a hundred percent perfect? Nope. But life's not a hundred percent perfect. So [00:17:00] we're shooting good averages there.
Mm-hmm. But it really is about seeing everyone fulfill their potential. Yeah, I like how you phrased that, seeing everyone fulfill their potential and it doesn't look the same as everybody, so you know, everyone's different. So whatever your potential is, go for it. Yep. Yeah, I know for my own son when he got this job for the KC current.
He, just, I mean, it means the world to him when he, goes to work, he is dressed and ready four or five hours before kickoff. That's right. He is so excited for the game time and he takes tickets. His job is to, scan because their tickets are on their phone. So he, scans their phones. Mm-hmm.
And then he tells everybody to enjoy the game and. He loves game days yeah, it his job. That's fantastic. Yeah. Those jobs for some of my clients who, being front facing may not [00:18:00] be completely their jam, but a little jam. That is a perfect job. Yeah. Perfect. He gets to see a couple thousand of his best friends on game day, so that's perfect for him.
Well, and it's so good for the current, and I have our local baseball team down here, the wind surge. I've had one or two people work there and it's similar kind of thing. It's fantastic. It's great. They get to talk to people and. It's pretty low stress, even though there's thousands of people coming in.
So, I mean, okay. Maybe a little stress, but life is a little stress, so we gotta figure that out. It's the healthy stress. So, what policy changes or community actions do you think would be helpful to, further reduce employment gaps and enhance workplace inclusion for people with disabilities?
First is transportation. Notice how I didn't even take time to think about that. First is transportation. That's huge. We have made strides, you know, we've got paratransit that will pick people up, take 'em where they're going, pick 'em up, bring 'em back home. We've got, [00:19:00] bus routes here, but it stops at six, you know, and if I have somebody working from, let's say, seven to nine.
Sorry, you're kind of outta luck figuring that out. How to get home. You could do Uber, but you're gonna spend a lot of your money. There's gotta be ways to subsidize some of those things, whether it's they're on the waiver and they can use some of that, they have a transportation pot where to go there.
That's not necessarily my jam. I don't know how all those ins and outs, but there has to be something that can be done that way. I feel like. Light rail might be a cool thing everywhere. I know they do that in like the Phoenix area. That's a pretty cool system. So that would be good to have in other places.
As far as employers go, I feel like training is a big one. Just, just more training. We've tried to do one so far here in the Wichita area where our Chamber of Commerce, we had a lunch and we had a panel. Where we did have a few employers, but we also had a couple providers. I was on the panel [00:20:00] just talking about, what are the advantages of hiring inclusively and what does it look like?
Mm-hmm. And that was what one of our employers talked about. And I mean, she was great and we just need to do more of that. We didn't have as many employers as I would've liked. You know, we had a lot of. Some of other entities from our area that help people with disabilities, but I really want more employers on our next one that we try to do.
Yeah, they're pretty essential to making it work. Right. It's just, it's a big one. I mean, just making sure that people know that it's fine. We all interact with people with disabilities more often. Than even 10 years ago, and I actually said this last week in my c when I was teaching that,, everyone is either touched in some way, has a child, has , a aunt, [00:21:00] uncle, cousin, whatever.
Or you've gone somewhere or somebody is working who has a disability. And that's just, it's so prevalent now that , we can't just sit and just. Cool. That's good. We, I know somebody who has that. Well, that's not good enough anymore. We've gotta get everyone integrated, Brian said, in his interview that everyone deserves to go into the community and see people just like them.
And I think, I think that's simple but powerful. And I remember, , way back. Over 20 years ago when I learned that and we didn't really have a prenatal diagnosis of my son, we learned that he may possibly have Down Syndrome. But I could only think of one person that I knew that had Down Syndrome, and that was only 20 years ago.
There weren't a lot of people, and granted I wasn't a small rural community, [00:22:00] but you know, it still wasn't, we've made a lot of strides even in the last 20 years, I guess is what I'm saying. And I just, what businesses don't understand is. And I do a lot of onboarding training now, which is not the most favorite part of my job.
Is sitting all these onboarding things, , where they give you all the perfect scenarios. And just an example, I was at the Taco Bell one yesterday and you know, I sat for hours and helped my client through all these videos. And every place talks about pride. , They talk about.
I'm super proud when you talk about Taco Bell, don't run it down. You work here. Yeah. And a lot of places who have a lot of transiency with, their employees, with ours, they're there. That's their job. That is their jam. Nothing means more to them than that job. It really doesn't. Absolutely.
And I have a guy at Buffalo Wild Wings. He wanted to work there [00:23:00] forever and they had a weird pre-interview before they got with me and that his parents were like, Hey, I don't know man. I don't know if that's gonna be it. And when he had another job that didn't quite work out, then he came to me and he was honestly one of my former students long time ago at East and known him forever.
And I said. What do you want to do? And he's like, I wanna do Buffalo Wild Wings. And I go, boy, you need to tell your mom. And she said, we're not doing that. I went and talked to him anyway just because, just to just feel it out. And I went and told her that they want to bring him in to talk to him.
This is over a year ago, year and a half ago. And she said, are you kidding? And I'm like, no, I'm not. I know what you said, but let's go talk to him. At least he wants it so bad. And so we did. And he is been there for a year and a half. It hasn't been perfect the whole time, but it's been good.
I went to see him yesterday just to pop in there, say, Hey, he was just doing his thing, being a host, helping seat people and it's great. And, but that, he, that's his jam. [00:24:00] He could feel like he works 80 hours a week, but he only works like five to six 'cause that's what he can handle. So a lot of our listeners are, teachers and school administrators.
So as somebody who has been in the school system and then transitioned out of the school system and also helps prepare future teachers, what's something the school system can do better to, help with post-secondary transition? I really feel like it's just, it's knowledge. It's taking time.. To show people the system.
Not every place has transition coordinators for one, and I'm trying to kind of work on that, with the Kansas Council on Disabilities. How can we train more, how can we maybe push this more with the state? Because I know the state does find validity in transitioned. And it's the legal part of the IEP, so that's a big one.
But just having someone that's there to take the time. I love my [00:25:00] job as a transition coordinator almost as much as I love my other one. I'm not sure which one my actual jam is, but , it is what it is. I love sitting down with parents and just telling 'em it's gonna be fine. And they, well, I don't know if it's gonna be, and I'm like, nobody ever knows if it's gonna be, but let's look at what we need and let me work with you to find the tools.
So I think we can just better prepare teachers and it can all fall on teachers. They're too dang busy. It's hard to do the teaching and also try to manage, as a mixed abilities teacher, we manage their lives. Not every administrator, not every district, level person, not every other teacher understands how much a mixed abilities teacher runs their lives.
And it, it's tough, but it's also rewarding. So I think our school districts need to understand the importance of transition and really putting stock in it because it does take more care to get [00:26:00] our sped guys where they need to go.
Yeah. , And it's not saying that just the gen pop. Going out into the world isn't scary. It is scary. It's real scary. But you're now throwing other factors in when you're talking about our sped population, and so we've gotta take care to help them stay afloat. It is a lot. Oh, soapbox.
Did you feel that? I felt soapbox. Yeah. So it's a soapbox. I'm often on too, so I agree with you. So, all right, last question. So reflecting on your experiences, what is one lesson you've learned from the individuals you've supported that you think would be helpful for every employer or community leader to know?
I feel it's just trusting the process, letting it be a learning curve, allowing [00:27:00] for that curve to happen. We can't just give it three months and say, well, they didn't get it. We got to give it a shot. Didn't work. It's making sure we're giving them time to breathe. That's a big one to me.
I honestly, I don't spend a ton of time job coaching because if I can find a spot that knows who I'm looking to place, we've met, we've talked, you know, we do all the pre stuff. If it's a good place, they're gonna train them. The natural support. Everyone else gets trained, right? Natural supports is where it's at.
I'm a huge proponent of that. I know they don't just appear overnight, but , if we can push that more, then I can help more people. 'cause I don't have to spend as many hours watching you do whatever your task is. I put you there 'cause I know you can do it.
You're just maybe nervous and everyone's nervous on their job, so I make sure I am available and I'm around, [00:28:00] but I'm not sitting there for seven hours a day. I suspect that if you are helping the, company or the agency build natural supports, for that one individual, you are, by default helping them build capacity for other individuals as well.
Yeah. And I think once, you know, once it's built, it is fine after that. Yeah. Everything is there. We've talked about it. We're good. It just also depends on the person. I have a person who has pretty high anxiety. We've been talk, we haven't really touched on much of this, but, , mental health and IDD is a, it's a weaving thing now more.
And so trying to get. Past anxiety is really tough. And I have a person who I've, I've helped lately, had spent a lot of time with them on the job or at least checking on them and walking around and coming back and checking on them, walking around, you know, that kind of thing.
'cause they [00:29:00] just need to see me and make sure I got them. And so I've done a lot of phone calls, a lot of pop outs, and it is gonna be okay. They need validation. Which also is job coaching. But when you're talking about having to, send that to the state, it looks different than, they're like, well, did you teach 'em how to do their task?
Well, no. They know how to do their task, but they need some help making sure we're good, making sure they feel supported. And so that's, I mean, obviously I really like doing that too. That's really fun. It's, again, it's the other teaching component. So what all services do you offer?
Like do you offer, professional development for school districts? Yes and no. I've gone out and done training on, what voc rehab looks like. How do they sign up? What? No one, they don't really know the process. A lot of school districts don't.
But here's the website. Sign up. Good luck. Yeah. Right now I just go around and talk about it. [00:30:00] 'cause it's a passion project.
But I also provide, you know, job coaching, job retention. Sometimes people already have the job. They just have some questions and so then I get to go in and try to help 'em do that. I mean, really sky's the limit. I don't really do a lot of job assessments. I would rather be finding jobs, doing placements and making sure that we're good.
And I'm finding that a lot of 'em are needing help in other ways. I'm kind of like a. Targeted case management without the title. Okay. Because they, they asked question that somebody asked for apartment the other day. I looked into this apartment, but they said it's gonna be a long wait list. Is there anything else?
And so I'll find it and, send them that. So that's why, I mean, I feel like a lot of my jobs are working in tandem. So sometimes I have to tell myself when I go in to talk to someone, which job is it for? What am I doing? So I don't accidentally say, Hey, I'm from Goddard. They're like, [00:31:00] okay so if somebody wants your services, how can they get ahold of you?
You can find, what's next. Disability employment services on Facebook. I haven't paid for a website yet 'cause I don't feel like I need to do that if I can do but they can do that my number and email's on there and not know how you're gonna blast this out with that stuff. But my phone number is pretty much across the world now, I think.
So I don't care if whoever has it, has it and they can reach out, send me a text, email, gimme a call, and we can talk about. What they need. Generally, I'll hear from people and I'll say, Hey, well let's go sit down and talk about what your ideas are or what you're needing and then we can build a plan from there.
Okay. Well, we'll link your, Facebook page in the show notes. So if anybody listening would like, support from Jason, we will, help you find him. I will maybe even wear a different shirt 'cause as my wife will. Test slash complain. [00:32:00] I have a million of these shirts. I think it's great and shout out to supportive spouses that help us entrepreneurs because, we could not do it without these supportive spouses.
That is exactly right. Well thank you Jason. Really appreciate you taking the time today to visit with me and really appreciate everything you're doing for these young adults and their families. You're really making a difference, so thank you. Sure. I appreciate it. And yes, shout out to spouses again, who really.
She's with kids all the time now 'cause they can't hang out with me all the time. But yes, I really appreciate you bringing me on. I obviously love to talk about this stuff and the end goal is getting everybody who wants to be out there. Out there. Yeah. Huge impact on quality of life for people with disabilities, it's very powerful.
