Randall Duchesneau Provides Imperative Information and Advice for Disability Advocates

Randy Duchesneau with RespectAbility Fellows and Staff

Rockville, Md., July 1 – With a great smile and warm-hearted tone of voice, Randall “Randy” Duchesneau was quick to capture the attention of RespectAbility Fellows last month. His empathetic persona, brilliance and prominent leadership skills truly reflected on his work as a disability activist.

Duchesneau is on the board of advisors for RespectAbility where he previously served as the National Leadership Program Director. His journey as a disability advocate started after he acquired a spinal cord injury that left him with quadriplegia at the age of 21.

Despite facing challenges with health care and the personal complications that come from depending on personal assistance to survive, Duchesneau has used his experience to help others. He is working toward improving the quality of life of people with disabilities, like himself.

Through his talk, Duchesneau focused on two critical topics involving people with disabilities: Attendant Care Services covered by Medicaid and awareness of the role ethnicity and culture can play in developing community among people with disabilities.

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A Conversation with National Disabilities Rights Network’s Curt Decker

Curt Decker with RespectAbility Fellows and Staff

Rockville, Md., June 30 – “Disability policy – we need to make sure that our policies and good intentions are followed up with good practices and actions,” advised Curt Decker on a bright Wednesday afternoon.

Serving as the current Executive Director of the National Disabilities Rights Network (NDRN), the largest non-governmental enforcer of disabilities rights, Decker is an integral member of the disability rights movement. As a passionate and motivating speaker, he delivered great insight and important information about the support systems presently in place for people with disabilities experiencing injustice.

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Advice from World-Renowned Pollster Stan Greenberg

Stan Greenberg with RespectAbility Fellows and Staff

Rockville, Md., June 30 – As the Fellows in RespectAbility waited in the conference room for a leading pollster to enter the room, the intimidation increased after being told how important this person is.

Stanley B. Greenberg is a world-renowned pollster and New York Times best-selling author. He is known for advising business leaders with a broad knowledge of social and modern economics, along with being a polling adviser to presidents, prime ministers and CEOs globally. He has conducted deep research in more than a dozen countries.

Greenberg visited the RespectAbility office to meet with the Fellows. He previously teamed up with the organization by conducting polling on voters with disabilities in comparison to voters without disabilities. He also conducted a focus group with Republicans who work on Capital Hill and what they know about people with disabilities.

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A Conversation with American Enterprise Institute’s Gerard Robinson

Gerard Robinson with RespectAbility Fellows and Staff

Rockville, Md., June 30 – Gerard Robinson, a resident fellow at American Enterprise Institute (AEI), visited Respectability to share with Fellows and staff about his experience and interests in education, policy and politics. Robinson discussed what skills he has found helpful throughout his career and his commitment to education.

“Mindfulness” is a concept and important skill for a successful career, according to Robinson. He said any individual who chooses to work in a political environment needs to be mindful or aware of a few key factors: the position that they occupy, the power and duties that come with occupying such position, decisions and actions will impact a community or targeted group, and the attitudes and reactions (negative and positive) that may result from the factors mentioned above.

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Advice on Capturing your Audience’s Attention from Pollster and Political Strategist Celinda Lake

Celinda Lake with RespectAbility Fellows and Staff

Rockville, Md., June 29 – Imagine you are a lioness, deep in the African safari. You keep watch over your young cubs that are rolling and tumbling around under the blazing sun nearby. Suddenly, out of the corner of your eye, you see something rustling the tall grass close to your cubs. You stand up, now on alert. A dry breeze wafts the stench of a hyena into your nose before a piercing laugh splits through the air; your cubs freeze. Baring your teeth, you walk toward the hyena that is now visible. As you get closer, you hear laughter coming from all around you and your cubs. You are surrounded. Even as the hyenas move in, you are committed to protecting your cubs, no matter what.

According to Celinda Lake, a person has the attention span of nine seconds; in order to capture that person’s eye, you must have a good story. During her talk with RespectAbility Fellows, Lake called upon her years of experience working for women candidates and nonprofit organizations working to increase the number of women in public office. When a woman is portrayed by the media or her opponent as being “aggressive,” she often is stereotyped as being too intimidating, and ultimately unlikeable. However, when the woman is shown as standing up for others, like a lioness, she is seen in a more positive light. Just because a woman is “intimidating,” does not mean she does not have a heart and the characteristics to “get the job done.” You cannot assume a person’s beliefs and values by simply looking at them.

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Learning from Political Expert Dan Hazelwood

Dan Hazelwood with RespectAbility Fellows and Staff

Rockville, Md., June 29 – “Win people through emotions,” Dan Hazelwood told an audience of attentive RespectAbility Fellows earlier this month. “The heart overrides logic.”

Hazelwood mastered the technique of captivating voters in the political world. His main expertise involves campaign strategy, message development, targeting and persuasion mail. A nationally recognized political campaign professional, his past clients included President George W. Bush and several U.S. senators and governors.

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A Conversation with Donna Meltzer: A Role Model for Disability Advocates

Donna Meltzer with RespectAbility Fellows and Staff

Rockville, Md., June 29 – Donna Meltzer, the CEO of the National Association of Councils on Developmental Disabilities (NACDD), is not an ordinary disability rights advocate. In fact, it was an internship with Congress that opened her eyes to a new world of activism. Since her internship, Meltzer worked for Rep. Tony Coelho, the father of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

Along with experience in numerous other positions within the disability field, Meltzer shared a wealth of information with the Fellows and staff at RespectAbility. We learned about the history of the ADA, as well as NACDD’s efforts in the evolving disability sector.

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Lessons from Eleanor Clift on Being the Underdog

Eleanor Clift with RespectAbility Fellows and Staff

Rockville, Md., June 28 – Eleanor Clift never aspired to be in a position where her words could influence a large audience’s opinion. However, when the opportunity arose for her to become the amazing reporter she is today, she did not pass it up.

Clift was a product of her generation where “if you were a girl, you aspired to be a homemaker, teacher, or nurse.”

Rather than constrict Clift’s development, the lack of expectations for girls her age served to give Clift a feeling of freedom to explore new opportunities. Initially Clift was a secretary for Newsweek. However, despite her sense of contentment in her secretarial position at Newsweek, she embraced new challenges and accepted the opportunity to cover presidential candidate Jimmy Carter, another underestimated underdog in society who proved the majority wrong. Since then, Clift has authored multiple books, reported for many publications and appeared in several talk shows and movies.

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Learning Effective Advocacy Strategies with Lisa Thomas of the American Federation of Teachers

Lisa Thomas with RespectAbility Fellows and Staff

Rockville, Md., June 28 – “The lack of cohesive, consistent messaging is the Achilles heel of the disability community,” Dr. Lisa Thomas told a group of RespectAbility Fellows earlier this month. “We do have competing priorities.”

Thomas, the Associate Director and Special Education Policy Analyst at the American Federation of Teachers, spoke about strategies and tactics advocating for employment of people with disabilities. Fully one-in-five Americans have a disability and polls show that most of them want to work. However, of the 22-million working-age people with disabilities, only one-in-three are employed. This leads to poverty and costs taxpayers billions of dollars in disability benefits.

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