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DISABLED JOINING HIGH-TECH FIRMS IN GREATER NUMBERS
By Vikas Bajaj
Dallas Morning News
September 11, 2000
After Allen Beers was blinded in a gun accident as a teenager, he
realized he could wallow in self-pity or accept the challenge and move
on.
"It was rough for the first six months," Beers said. "Then I decided I
wanted to get on with life."
Several jobs and a few decades later, Beers, now 47, has found his
calling--computer programming.
He started a programming job in spring at TXU Electric after
graduating from an eight-month El Centro College program for people
with disabilities who are interested in high-tech jobs.
Beers is one of a growing number of workers with physical or mental
disabilities working in high-tech industries, disability experts say.
The number of disabled workers in tech, however, remains low. The U.S.
Commerce Department estimates that they make up about 5.8 percent of
the science and engineering labor force, even though 20 percent of the
American population has some sort of physical, mental or emotional
disability.
The Center for Computer Assistance to the Disabled in Dallas trains
workers on computer hardware and software that can help them in their
job hunts. Andrew Gibson, the center's managing director, says
businesses are slowly changing their ways.
"The tightness of the job market has helped make employers entertain
the very able clients we deal with," he said. "But it's still more
difficult than it needs to be."
It's illegal for employers to discriminate against people with
disabilities under the Americans with Disabilities Act, which is now
10 years old.
TXU, which employs Beers and two other disabled programmers, says its
experience proves that workers with disabilities are a benefit to
companies.
Most programmers have difficulty reading encrypted programming code,
but Beers streams right through it, with the of screen-reading
software, said Glenn Loveless, TXU's manager of customer systems
application development.
High-tech companies are better at hiring workers with disabilities
than most employers, said Scott Hudson, a vocational rehabilitation
counselor for the Texas Commission for the Blind in Ft. Worth.
"Maybe they are just more open-minded because they are dealing with
abstract results," Hudson said. "They are looking at what they can do
more so than others."
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