People with disabilities face gap in higher education employment

Excerpt from: Minnesota Daily (click for full article)

 

Sandra Buchholz has had difficulty landing a job because she’s deaf.

Some employers wouldn’t hire her because her deafness would make it hard to communicate, said Buchholz, who works as an American Sign Language instructor at the University of Minnesota.

“I would say that there are a lot of deaf people out there who have a tough time getting a job because of their disability,” she said through an interpreter.

Nationwide, there’s a large gap in the employment of people with mental or physical disabilities — the unemployment rate for people with disabilities is almost double the rate for those without, according to the U.S. Department of Labor.