Kathleen L. Brockway was a Nonprofit Management Fellow in RespectAbility’s National Leadership Program. RespectAbility is a nonprofit organization fighting stigmas and advancing opportunities for and with people with disabilities. Kathleen earned her bachelor’s degree in 2006 from the University of Phoenix. She was a graduate student at Goucher College and studied Cultural Sustainability. She hopes to become a historian, folklorist or cultural worker to sustain deaf history and culture.
Brockway came to RespectAbility because she was interested in gaining experience with program development and fundraising. Personally, she also is interested in sustaining deaf history and culture and advocating for important issues such as cleaning up the history of deaf education. She also advocates on her own time for collaboration between deaf history and culture museums and the state deaf schools through ASL Rose Company. She is passionate about research and experienced in gathering research and cultural documentation. As a deaf author, she has published two books on “Baltimore’s Deaf Heritage” and “Detroit’s Deaf Heritage.” She also has contributed articles such as “History of the Deaf Grassroots Movement” and background information on the early Virginia deaf history with the Virginia School for the Deaf Alumni Association. In the past, she served as a Chair of the Deaf Culture and History Section at the National Association of the Deaf for three years. Brockway also has been inducted in the Susan M. Daniels Disability Mentoring Hall of Fame in the Class of 2016 sponsored by National Disability Mentoring Coalition.
During Brockway’s free time, she loves to read non-fiction, history and biography, as well as to travel to explore the deaf historical sites. While exploring, she usually makes videos to post on YouTube or Instagram and shares her findings or tells a story about the sites, things or individuals in deaf history. Currently, she is working on a book about early Virginia deaf history while researching her own deaf ancestry. She also loves to watch action and romantic movies on her own quiet time.
