Since its inception in 1880 and early achievement securing the right to federal civil service employment, the NAD has continuously sought to increase employment opportunities for people who are deaf or hard of hearing.
Other NAD efforts contribute to increasing opportunities for employment. These include improving access to early education and higher education; ensuring the availability and provision of vocational rehabilitation services; securing reasonable accommodations; fostering innovation and use of technology; and encouraging entrepreneurship.
The NAD also works in coalition with national disability consumer groups. We are engaged at the national level to establish a commission to develop new employment initiatives. We advocate to increase employment in the federal workforce. We seek to ensure that state employment programs and services are accessible. We also want to increase interagency efforts to provide pre-employment, training, mentoring, and internship programs in the public and private sectors for students transitioning from school to work. Further, we advocate to include deaf and hard of hearing business owners as eligible for Small Business Administration loans and federal contracting opportunities.