Transition to Retirement: A Guide to Inclusive Practice

Description

As much as everyone groans from time to time about the humdrum and stresses of work, retirement is an unsettling prospect for most people. It's a major transition in anyone's life and change of this magnitude often arouses anxiety. This is much more so for people with disability, particularly intellectual disability. But, as this manual shows, it doesn't have to be like that. The Transition to Retirement (TTR) program has been developed in response to a genuine problem: the need for an effective approach to supporting older employees to build an active, socially inclusive lifestyle after retirement. The approach mapped out in this manual may not be the solution for all workers with disability, but it will certainly assist quite a few. The TTR program emphasises social inclusion. It is consistent with the focus of the National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) on building community participation and independence. It is also consistent with the National Disability Strategy's emphasis on promoting social inclusion in mainstream community settings and service systems. The TTR program supports ageing people with disability to develop new interests, skills and social networks, and facilitates their participation in mainstream community groups. With the manual comes a DVD, which makes the idea of inclusive activities in retirement easily understandable to people with disability, their families and community organisations. Author royalties from sales of this manual to the Australian Foundation for Disability (AFFORD) to support AFFORD's Transition to Retirement program.

Roger Stancliffe is a professor of intellectual disability at the University of Sydney's Centre for Disability Research and Policy. Nathan Wilson is a senior lecturer at Western Sydney University based in the School of Nursing and Midwifery. Nicolette Gambin is the Transition to Retirement coordinator at the Australian Foundation for Disability (AFFORD). Christine Bigby is the director of the Living with Disability Research Centre at LaTrobe University.

'Its scientific foundation is its strength, and the disciplined approach to its construction circumscribes its initial claims to validity and utility. Here we have a clear first step in a standardised manual for a best practice. The TTR needs and deserves to be followed in research as it is applied ... ' -- Michael Millington * The Australian Journal of Rehabilitation Counselling * 'The book "Transition to Retirement: A Guide to Inclusive Practice" is a world leading exemplar of a project that can address this inequality for older adults with intellectual disabilities ... A strength of this manual is that it has been written alongside staff from a local charity who have implemented the Transition to Retirement project adding sound advice regarding the enablers as well as the barriers to implementing this project in practice ... I would highly recommend this book to educators, researchers, commissioners and service providers and it should be on the bookshelves of everyone concerned with how adults with intellectual disabilities age in order to plan a more active and inclusive retirement.' -- Laurence Taggart * Journal of Policy and Practice in Intellectual Disabilities * ' ... the book is clear and concise, and will be a useful resource for its primary audience of social care workers who provide employment support services.' -- Elizabeth Perkins * Learning Disability Practice * ' ... the manual is set within the Australian context, [but] the themes and practical suggestions are transferable to other countries and cultures and, all in all, it is a good guide to have to hand.' -- Rachel Forrester-Jones * Tizard Learning Disability Review *