Positive Approaches Journal, Volume 8, Issue 1

Volume 8 ► Issue 1 ► 2019

Data Discoveries

Data Discoveries presents useful data in ways that are interesting and customizable. Data presented will be focused on a topic that is relevant for each issue theme and seek to promote new ideas about what data to use and how to use it.

Employment plays an important role in helping individuals with and without a disability live independently and participate in their communities. Providing employment support services is a specialty for some providers, providers include it across multiple types of services they provide, or providers link to employment services separately.

In this issue, Data Discoveries presents employment data from the Office of Developmental Programs (ODP). ODP instituted new questions asking program participants if they have a job and, among those who are working, a variety of questions including the type of job they have and the number of hours they work each week. In this issue of Positive Approaches, Data Discoveries includes employment data that can be filtered over time:

1. The doughnut chart displays the proportion of people in ODP programs who had a competitive, integrated job.

2. The suitcase figure shows the proportion of people with an employment goal on their ISP.

3. Among people who are employed, job types are shown in the bottom bar chart. 

Use the filters for year and season to see how these numbers change over time and to familiarize yourself with Tableau. The filter for seasons applies only to the Job Type figure at the bottom since seasons and corresponding weather impact Job Type trends. The interactive features, including drop down filters, allow for easy viewing of changes over the three years.