Students with disabilities: How ready are they for the 21st century?

Employment success in the 21st century requires that students with disabili ties possess career maturity and personal flexibility. Past research, howev er, has indicated that students with disabilities experience a significant "developmental lag" with respect to career maturity. To determine whether t hat conclusion still pertained, this study compared the career development levels of 95 special education and 99 general education students. Although both groups had optimistic career outlooks, evidence indicated that special education students had significantly lower scores than their general-educa tion peers on career decision-making self efficacy, career outcome expectat ions, career exploration intentions, and vocational identity. Implications of the findings for educational and rehabilitation programming are discusse d.