Internationally, expected outcomes and community values are driving secondary schools to better prepare all students to effectively participate in adult life.  Teachers of students with special needs are under particular pressure because many of these students are experiencing poor work and living outcomes on exiting school.  When comparisons were made between OECD countries (OECD, 2007), Australia ranked 13 out of 19 for employment rates for persons with a disability.  Data from two key Australian studies augment these results and show a bleak picture for school leavers with special needs.  In New South Wales, Riches, Parmenter, and Robertson (1996) provided a comprehensive overview of post-school outcomes for school leavers with disabilities (N = 544).  Findings indicated that 50% of the sample reported that they were in some form of paid employment, 8% were continuing with further education and training, and the majority of individuals (89%) were still living at home, with 61% indicating that they spent most of their free time with family members.  A decade later, a Queensland government-funded study investigated the relationship between outcomes for students with intellectual disability, autism, or dual diagnosis and the transition practices in schools from parent and teacher perspectives (for overview, see Meadows, 2009).  Findings of a state-wide survey of parents (N = 218) indicated that the situation for young adults with disabilities, particularly those with high support needs, and their families had improved little over the years (Davies & Beamish, 2009).  Although parents reported that a quarter of the young adults (n = 53) had paid jobs in regular community settings, almost two thirds worked for less than 20 hours per week. Less than a quarter (n = 47) of the young adults attended a tertiary institution, with the majority studying at a Technical and Further Education College. Not surprisingly, almost a half of parents (n = 102) reported that considerable family adjustment was required when their young adult left school. In addition, a state-wide survey of staff was conducted to examine transition practice in schools (Beamish, Meadows, & Davies, 2012).  Practices were drawn from the five practice areas of the Transition Practices Taxonomy (Kohler, 1996).  While responding staff (N = 104) strongly endorsed (accepted) and implemented practices in the area of family-school relations, they signaled much lower levels of endorsement and implementation in the areas of interagency collaboration and program structure.

Within this context, the Australian Government announced a $200 million short-term initiative in 2012 to build the capacity of State, Independent, and Catholic schools to improve the educational and post-school outcomes of students with disabilities.  This paper describes how benchmark or baseline data were collected from school staff, parents, post-school personnel and students as the first step in an action research project aimed to build school capacity to improve the post-school outcomes of students with special needs across 14 secondary Catholic colleges in south-east Queensland, Australia.

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