FOR RELEASE:  July 17, 2018 

Ohio Employers Get High Scores on Disability Equality Index

COLUMBUS, OH – Opportunities for Ohioans with Disabilities (OOD) congratulates several Ohio employers who were recently recognized as 2018 Best Places to Work for Disability Inclusion by the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD) and Disability:IN (formerly the US Business Leadership Network). To earn this distinction, businesses must score 80 points or higher on a scale from 0 to 100 on the Disability Equality Index (DEI), a national benchmarking tool that allows America’s leading corporations to self-report their disability policies and practices. The Index measures key performance indicators across organizational culture, leadership, accessibility, employment, community engagement, support services and supplier diversity.

The following Ohio employers scored 100% on the DEI: American Electric Power (AEP), Aramark, Booz Allen Hamilton, CVSHealth, Huntington National Bank, JP Morgan Chase, Manpower Group, Meijer, Procter & Gamble, Synchrony, US Bank and Verizon. Those Ohio employers scoring 90% include Northwestern Mutual and United Parcel Service (UPS); 80%: Amazon and Norfolk Southern Corporation. Collectively, OOD has assisted more than 300 individuals with disabilities to obtain employment with these businesses since January 2017.

OOD partners with these 2018 Best Places to Work employers plus hundreds of other companies throughout Ohio to promote employment for individuals with disabilities. OOD also provides services to employers at no cost, including recruitment assistance of job ready candidates with disabilities, disability etiquette and disability awareness training for employees, plus hiring events and job fairs.

More information about how OOD’s Business Relations staff support disability inclusion practices in the workplace can be found at OOD-Employers/Business Relations Team. An Employer Toolkit that provides information about recruiting, hiring and retaining workers with disabilities is available at Ohio Department of Job and Family Services.

OOD is the state agency responsible for assisting individuals with disabilities to gain meaningful employment, to live independently or receive disability benefits through the Social Security Administration. www.ood.ohio.gov. 

The services described are funded, in part, with federal funds awarded by the U.S. Department of Education (DOE) under the Vocational Rehabilitation (VR), Supported Employment Services, and the Independent Living Services for Older Individuals Who are Blind (OIB) programs. For purposes of the VR program, the federal VR grant paid 78.7% of the total costs of the program. In federal fiscal year (FFY) 2018, the VR agency received $100,336,097 in federal VR funds. Funds appropriated by the state paid 21.3% of the total costs $27,155,767 under the VR program.