Ronda - 2:12

>> We have transition assistants that work with our high school transition counselors, and we have had the ability to have them step up and take on a larger role with being a liaison to Del Tech.

In our Newcastle County campuses we've actually got a part-time VR counselor who has office space at Del Tech and is working primarily out of the Del Tech campus to be that liaison much more directly, and that's really been a pilot that we started last year.

That has helped tremendously because our VR counselors who are typically working with the students at Del Tech are assigned to the high schools almost every single day of the week, and so it's been really difficult for them to be able to stay connected and really provide the support to these new high school students and college students.

And I think what we have found is that when you go to college, whether you have a disability or not, it's a huge transition and we all benefit more by having individualized support.

So the partnership between our VR counselor and the college counselor; she has a great relationship with all the staff that are involved at Del Tech, and she's able to get to both campuses.

She's able to check in on all the students so even if they haven't formally been transferred to her caseload from the high school counselors, if they're attending Del Tech, whether they're a first year or a second year student, they're able to work with our college counselor there, and she's able to kind of stay in contact and be the liaison not only about VR and Del Tech for that student but then also back to their VR counselor who could be in one of the other offices.

So we're at a point now where we're able to collect a lot better data.

Del Tech has been really good to work with us on what we need.

We have a lot of students who we anticipated needing additional supports that were not traditionally offered at Del Tech, and we wanted to find a way to partner with them because not only does it help DVR to have students attending and going all the way through the program, but it also helps Del Tech to be able to retain their students.

So it's been a good collaboration.