Project Description:
This project promotes the dissemination, adoption, and utilization of ExploreVR, a community-developed public web portal initiated under the auspices of the NIDRR-funded Rehabilitation Research and Training Center on Vocational Rehabilitation Research (VR-RRTC, 2007-2012). The original project gathered data from multiple employment systems to provide detailed descriptive information on the constellation of employment services for people with disabilities in all 50 states, the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico, and US territories, with the goal of offering a compendium for researchers, practitioners, and policymakers and create a base of knowledge that provides a foundation for future research and evaluation efforts. The original data collection has been expanded into a community-driven and -managed web portal making this a unique resource from data portals and resources currently available to the VR community. During this project, developers enhance ExploreVR in partnership with content and technical experts to provide accessible data for VR practitioners, policymakers, and rehabilitation researchers; link survey research variables with administrative data; import survey research datasets from various researchers into the portal to enable cross-organizational analysis and reduce respondent burden and fatigue; promote the generation of research and evaluation contracts by putting publicly collected data into the marketplace; and test and evaluate methods for promoting adoption and utilization of ExploreVR among VR practitioners, policymakers, and rehabilitation researchers.
Keyword(s):
data, research, policy, vocational rehabilitation
