Minnesota's Road to Volunteer Drivers Virtual Forum Series
5th Stop: Person-Centered, Cultural Diversity, and Equity Training
Wednesday, March 17, 2021
9:30 – 11:30 a.m. and 1:00 – 3:00 p.m. Central Time
Description
This will be the fifth stop in the MCOTA volunteer driver virtual forum series, Minnesota's Road to Volunteer Drivers.
Program
Introduction
9:30 – 9:40 a.m.
Tom Gottfried, MCOTA Executive Director
Person-Centered Practices and Disability Etiquette for Volunteer Drivers
9:40 – 11:30 a.m.
Abbie Wells-Herzog, Autism Specialist, and Ann Macheledt, Staff Training and Development Specialist, Vocational Rehabilitation Services, Minnesota Department of Economic Development
Cultural Diversity and Equity Training
1:00 – 3:00 p.m.
Heather Stein, Interim Director, Diversity and Equal Opportunity, Minnesota Department of Economic Development (invited)
Speakers
Abbie Wells-Herzog is the autism specialist for Vocational Rehabilitation Services (VRS), a division of the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development. Abbie has worked in the disability and employment sector for more than 30 years. Abbie began working for the State of Minnesota as a VR counselor in 2000. Abbie is involved in the VRS person-centered initiative and customized employment training. She serves on the state Autism Interagency Committee, the PACER Board, and the Autism Council. She has an M.S. in rehabilitation counseling from the University of Arizona.
Ann Macheledt is a staff training and development specialist for Vocational Rehabilitation Services (VRS), a division of the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development. Ann has worked in rehabilitation and the disability arena for more than 25 years. She has been with VRS for more than four years and co-leads the person-centered community of practice. Prior to that, she directed a corporate accommodation and return-to-work program for UnitedHealth Group. Ann also worked in the nonprofit sector for more than 15 years as consultant, serving more than 550 companies and agencies to help meet their ADA/ADAAA compliance, training, and retention needs. She has a master’s degree in rehabilitation counseling psychology from UW-Madison and is a national certified rehabilitation counselor (CRC).
Heather Stein is interim director of diversity and equal opportunity with the Minnesota Department of Employment and Economic Development. Heather has more than 10 years of experience as a diversity, equity, and inclusion leader working with diverse populations in adult education, human resources, and equal opportunity. She specializes in leading organizational change to celebrate the diversity of employees and improve inclusive workplace cultures, strengthening employee engagement, and enhancing service delivery to diverse clients. She has been with the State of Minnesota for nearly six years, most recently serving as the affirmative action officer at the Department of Education and inclusion and engagement director at the Department of Corrections. In her current role at Minnesota DEED, Heather oversees diversity recruitment, ADA and EO compliance, harassment and discrimination investigations, and diversity and inclusion training and consultation.
Registration
The virtual forum is free to attend, but registration is required. After you register, you will receive an email confirmation with Zoom login information for the forum. You will also receive an email reminder with the login information one day prior to and one hour prior to the start of the event. Your login information should not be shared with others; each person must register individually.
Please note: By registering for this forum, you will automatically be registered for all forum series events. You may attend as many as you wish using the same Zoom information. If you have previously registered for any other forum events, you do not need to register again.
If you're unable to join the live broadcast, a recording with captioning and ASL interpretation will be available here following the event.
Accommodation
MnDOT invites and encourages participation by all. This event will include live captioning and ASL interpretation.
If you need a foreign language interpreter, documents in an alternative format (such as braille, large print, or a different language), or another reasonable accommodation for this web page, registration, or event, please contact Kaydee Kirk at least two weeks before the event by email at [email protected] or by phone at 612-626-5854.
Virtual Forum Access
This webinar will be hosted using Zoom. We recommend that all registrants test their connection prior to the workshop using Zoom's test meeting. If you are new to Zoom, we recommend viewing the Zoom Tips for Joining and Participating in Webinars tutorial page.
Professional Development Hours
To the best of our knowledge, this event meets the continuing education requirements for 2.0 Professional Development Hours (PDHs) credit. If you participate in the virtual forum and would like to request a PDH form, please email [email protected] after the event. We will email the form to you following the event.
More Information
Please contact Kaydee Kirk at 612-626-5854 or [email protected] with any questions.
Sponsors
Sponsored by the Minnesota Department of Transportation (MnDOT), the Minnesota Council on Transportation Access (MCOTA) in partnership with the Minnesota Volunteer Driver Coalition.