October is National Disability Employment Awareness Month (NDEAM). As a regular reader of our Jewish Disability Perspectives newsletter, you know that RespectAbility has been training Fellows to work in the Jewish community and beyond since 2013. In honor of NDEAM, we’ve decided to celebrate some of the professional accomplishments and contributions of some of our [click to continue...]
I hope that everyone had a lovely Rosh Hashanah, and especially that you were able to find the access that you needed. In fact, if you had an access experience, positive or negative, RespectAbility would love to hear about it. Send your accounts to JoshuaS@RespectAbility.org. For those still looking for an accessible experience for next [click to continue...]
Shabbat shalom and shana tova from RespectAbility! We hope you have a great year ahead and enjoy the animation above, created by former Jewish Inclusion Fellow Ben Rosloff. He is the force behind the disability film series “What Do You Pray For?” At our website, you can find a list of accessible high holiday services. [click to continue...]
Los Angeles, California, August 13 – The disability nonprofit RespectAbility is pleased to announce the release of a new toolkit to help congregations ensure their High Holiday services and related events are accessible – “Opening All Gates: Making High Holiday Celebrations Accessible to All, In Person and Online.” The rise of the Delta variant and the [click to continue...]
I was privileged to deliver the following in a “sermon slam” for the Jewish holiday of Shavuot a few years ago. The holiday of Shavuot, literally translated as weeks, is celebrated 7 weeks after Passover, to celebrate the Revelation at Mount Sinai. Tradition teaches that every Jew, past, present, and future, stood together at Sinai [click to continue...]
We often save this space for other voices, but in addition to being the editor of this newsletter, I am also a Jew with a disability, and today I want to share with you my perspective on the power of togetherness. RespectAbility is proud to be a member of the Network of Jewish Human Service [click to continue...]
JFNA partnered with RespectAbility to host a series of convenings for all of us who are passionate about the advocacy agenda of the JDAM sessions. We gathered informally on Zoom for facilitated discussions, sharing strategies, learning from each other, and planning action steps so that together we can pursue disability justice and inclusion for all. [click to continue...]
Before we share some exciting news, we wanted to say something about the events of the past week in Washington, D.C. The violence we witnessed on Capitol Hill was awful, unacceptable and profoundly painful. What we saw happen should never have happened and should never happen again. We also know that people might be facing [click to continue...]
Talented speakers available for online conferences, educational programs and other events Los Angeles, California, Dec. 21 – Fully 1-in-4 adults has a physical, sensory, cognitive or mental health disability and people with disabilities can be the most talented people on earth. Indeed, Thomas Edison – America’s most famous inventor – was deaf. Harriet Tubman freed [click to continue...]
Those who follow the work of RespectAbility know that Lauren Appelbaum, our VP of Communications, is the incredible dynamic force behind our Hollywood Inclusion work. Lauren is also a deeply committed Jew, a graduate of the Jewish Theological Seminary, and a superstar Jewish mom. It’s perhaps not surprising, therefore, that Jewish Women International chose Lauren [click to continue...]
