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Aboriginal students experience disproportionate academic disadvantage at school. It may be that a capacity to effectively deal with academic setback and challenge (academic buoyancy) can reduce the incidence of academic adversity. To the extent that this is the case, academic buoyancy may also be associated with positive educational intentions. This study explores the role of academic buoyancy in Aboriginal students’ post-school educational intentions.

The survey-based study comprises Aboriginal (N = 350) and non-Aboriginal (N = 592) high school students in Australia.

Academic buoyancy yielded larger effect sizes for Aboriginal than non-Aboriginal students’ educational intentions – particularly in senior high school when educational intentions are most likely to translate into post-school educational behaviour.

Post-school education is one pathway providing access to social opportunity. Any thorough consideration of students’ passage into and through post-school education must first consider the bases of students’ academic plans and, by implication, their decision to pursue further study. Identifying factors such as academic buoyancy in this process provides some specific direction for practice and policy aimed at optimizing Aboriginal students’ academic and non-academic development.

Academic buoyancy is a recently proposed construct in the psycho-educational literature and has not been investigated among Aboriginal student populations. Its role in relation to post-school educational intentions is also a novel empirical contribution for both Aboriginal and non-Aboriginal students alike.

In the years following high school, youth, including youth with extensive support needs, aspire to pursue a range of personally important experiences, such as attending postsecondary education programs, obtaining competitive employment, and living independently. However, the level of disability continues to be a powerful predictor of the degree to which desired outcomes materialize in early adulthood. For most young adults with extensive support needs, valued outcomes are elusive. To support youth with disabilities, including youth with extensive support needs, to progress toward achieving their post-school goals, the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act of 1990 mandated the provision of transition services. Despite the legal mandate for transition services, numerous factors continue to impact the outcomes experienced by youth with extensive support needs. However, research has identified numerous practices to support improved post-school outcomes. In this chapter, we address the transition mandates of the IDEA, identify and describe factors influencing the post-school outcomes of youth with extensive support needs, and provide strategies, practices, and interventions for improving these outcomes.

Research has documented post-school outcomes for students with emotional and behavioral disabilities and learning disabilities continue to be poor. To improve student outcomes for these populations, research has recommended implementing evidence-based practices and predictors in the classroom. The purpose of this chapter is to identify evidence-based practices and predictors targeted for students with emotional and behavioral disorders and learning disabilities in the area of secondary transition. We identify and briefly describe 12 evidence-based practices and 14 evidence-based predictors for students with emotional and behavioral disorders and learning disabilities. Implications for practice and suggestions for future research are also discussed.

Over the last decade, there has been a significant increase of students with intellectual disabilities attending mainstream primary and secondary-level education in the Republic of Ireland (McConkey et al., 2017). Despite this increase, it appears that comparatively few of these students successfully transition to further/higher education and/or employment opportunities. This chapter examines typical transition support/guidance provided to students with intellectual disabilities as they prepare to complete their post-primary education in a mainstream setting. Using data from a study of school principals and school personnel responsible for career guidance and transition planning, the findings show guidance is limited for students with intellectual disabilities. Instead of being the responsibility of career guidance counsellors, guidance and transitions planning for students with intellectual disabilities are viewed as being the role of other personnel such as the school SENCO. By assigning this responsibility to special education roles in the school, students with intellectual disabilities may run the risk of having narrow and limited career options presented to them. This study raises serious questions about the effectiveness of mainstream schools in facilitating this critical transition stage for students who have intellectual disabilities.

The incentive structure, consequent on the institutional structure, significantly influences expectations. However, in this context, differences in individual perceptions of opportunities and capacities to pursue them broadly relate to socio‐economic background, school and community‐related factors. The main finding on the relationship between expectations and post‐school choice is that an overwhelming majority of students expect significant improvement in income, career opportunities, social prestige and marriage prospects, regardless of intended post‐school choice. There is very little variation in response across groups. However, whether an individual actually goes to college will depend on his/her capacity to act on an opportunity.

Transition from secondary school to adult life is a critical period in students' lives. Transition programs delivered at school play an important role in supporting students with disabilities to achieve successful post-school outcomes particularly in the case of transition to work whereby employment is acknowledged as the main target after graduating from secondary school. Post-school outcomes for students with disabilities related to employment, however, remain poor compared to students without disabilities. Using the taxonomy for transition programming and Bronfenbrenner's ecological system theory, this chapter proposes a model and action that needs to be taken in advancing school to work transition programming in Indonesia.

Numerous social conditions directly impact young people with disabilities as they enter adulthood. One such condition is the difficulty these individuals face in obtaining competitive work in an integrated setting. The consequence of this social reality is further magnified when they have received inadequate preparation for employment. Additional quality of life inhibitors often include isolation, dependence, and lack of control over their own lives. These and other social challenges have prompted the United States to initiate a national movement known as transition, which refers to the process of helping young people with disabilities prepare to successfully assume adult roles and responsibilities in a more integrative, collaborative, and supportive community.

The purpose of this chapter is to examine what it means for students with extensive support needs (ESN) to have opportunities to learn (OTL), why OTL is inexplicably tied to inclusive practices, and the in-school and post-school outcomes when students have OTL. Research will be provided that supports positive in-school and post-school outcomes, when students are provided equitable learning opportunities in inclusive contexts. Given the difference in possible outcomes for students with ESN when they do and do not have OTL, excluding them from general education contexts, where they have the best access to the intended and enacted curricula, is both unethical and limiting to society as a whole.

Interagency collaboration is an effective strategy for supporting students and families with resources and support to prepare students for life after high school. The Communicating Interagency Relationships and Collaborative Linkages for Exceptional Students (CIRCLES) is the only interagency collaboration model identified as a research-based practice, which means the CIRCLES model has the most and highest quality of evidence for its use among interagency collaboration models. Within this chapter, we overview the CIRCLES model and its history. School districts from multiple states have implemented CIRCLES, and, within this chapter, we overview stakeholder experiences with CIRCLES. When implementing any practice, evaluation and implementation fidelity are critical, so we provide suggestions for both. Finally, we discuss barriers and strategies to effective interagency collaboration, in addition to implications for policy and practice.

The purpose of this paper is to examine the effectiveness of participation in workplace learning among senior secondary students in Australia. Work placements are deemed to be effective if they meet policy objectives of improving student transitions by (a) enhancing Year 12 completion rates and (b) increasing the engagement of participants in post‐school work or study. Engagement is defined as full‐time study, full‐time work, some full‐time/part‐time combination, or two simultaneous part‐time engagements (e.g. part‐time work and part‐time study).

Propensity score matching is used to address selection bias into work placements. After controlling for numerous student background characteristics and creating equivalent comparison groups, we estimate the influence of participation in work placements on Year 12 completion and post‐school engagement.

It is found that participation in work placements during Year 11 is associated with a 5.2 percent increase in Year 12 completion and a 3.8 percent increase in full‐time engagement one year after the modal Year 12 completion age.

The study is somewhat limited by its moderate sample size (n=880; 440 workplace learning participants matched with 440 comparable non‐participants). Moreover, it seems likely that considerable variation exists in the quality of workplace learning programmes. It would be useful to examine what specific qualitative aspects of work placements produce positive transition outcomes.

The findings suggest potential benefits from increasing participation in work placements during Year 11 for students who undertake vocational education and training in schools (VETiS) and those who are lower‐achieving.

Previous research has questioned the value of VETiS for Year 12 completion, and the overall benefit of Year 12 completion to lower‐achieving students. This paper expands on the extant literature by suggesting that participation in workplace learning may contribute to more successful transition outcomes for lower‐achieving students and those taking VET courses.