Vocational Rehabilitation

Program funding for vocational rehabilitation was enough to serve only a small fraction--about seven percent--of the estimated 13.4 million Americans with disabilities who were potentially eligible in 1989. Congress, recognizing that choices had to be made about whom to serve, passed legislation in 1973 requiring programs to focus services on individuals with severe disabilities. Further, states that cannot serve all eligible applicants must prioritize services to those with the most severe disabilities through an order-of-selection procedure. This report looks at why some states do not use order of selection, how other states implement order of selection, and how the Department of Education oversees state compliance with the requirement.

GAO found that: (1) more than half the states have never used order of selection; (2) the 11 non-order-of-selection states visited claimed to be in compliance with the act because they could serve all eligible applicants; (3) the 11 states used such case-load management techniques as reducing outreach efforts when demand exceeded their resources, which made it appear that they were meeting demand; (4) overall, the case-load percentage of clients with severe disabilities among the nine order-of-selection states was higher than all other states; (5) the Rehabilitation Services Administration (RSA) has provided inadequate guidance and oversight, regarding order of selection; (6) the non-order-of-selection states expressed concern that implementing order of selection would be administratively burdensome and unfair to clients with less severe disabilities; and (7) most order-of-selection states implemented order of selection continuously, rather than only using it as resources declined.

Recommendations

Our recommendations from this work are listed below with a Contact for more information. Status will change from "In process" to "Open," "Closed - implemented," or "Closed - not implemented" based on our follow up work.

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