Repetto honored for assisting students with disabilities in transition to adulthood

For years, UF’s Transition Center has been assisting hundreds of students with disabilities make the transition from K-12 school to the demands of adulthood. Associate Professor Jeanne Repetto, co-founder and director of the center, will be honored for her work by the Council for Exceptional Children in April.

The council’s Division on Career Development and Transition is giving Repetto its Donn Brolin Award, an honor presented annually to someone who displays exceptional leadership in transition assistance for people with disabilities.

The Transition Center at UF traces its roots back to 1990, when Repetto and then-COE Professor Stuart Schwartz created the Florida Network, a resource center, to disseminate information on transition to educators, district officials and parents.

That network has grown into a UF center, funded through grants from the State of Florida and other funding agents, that operates in school districts statewide, providing technical assistance to agency personnel, teachers and parents on transition, conducting research on transition practices, and distributing the results of that research to educators.

Repetto said she is honored to receive an award named for Donn Brolin, the University of Missouri professor who pioneered the idea of “life-centered education” for students with disabilities.

“This brings me full circle,” she said. “I studied under Donn Brolin, when he was one of the few people talking about transition issues, and he was the person who inspired me to work in this area.”