WEBVTT

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So,

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My name is Michelle Nario - Redmond

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I am a social psychologist and

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teach at Hiram College

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in psychology and biomedical
humanities program

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and I just wrote a book on Abilism
the causes and consequences

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of disability prejudice.
My first memory

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and I'll just back up and say in 1990,

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when the ADA passed 
I was in graduate school,

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in Kansas, and disability prejudice,
the ADA or anything

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related to disability issues 
were completely off my radar,

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and I worked at a place 
where one of the pioneers

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of disability studies worked, 
Beatrice Wright,

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and I hadn't yet to have a class with her.

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It really wasn't until 1995,
which was five years later,

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when my daughter was born,
Sierra, with spina bifida,

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that I became aware 
of disability and found the work

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of Carol Gill and Simi Litton
and began to educate myself

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on disability studies and its scope,
and the first memory I have of

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confronting inaccessible spaces
was a few years later, when we enrolled

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my daughter Sierra in a preschool,
at a catholic preschool,

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right down the road; and it just didn't
even dawn on me that we would have to

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work so hard for her to be accommodated
as a preschooler,

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and it was really a function of
the fact that the building was older,

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there were steps, and they really didn't
know, nor did they need to legally know,

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about reasonable accommodations 
and civil rights of their students,

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because they were a private facility and
weren't subject to the ADA's rules.

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So... it became clear to me that 
we needed to find a new preschool,

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and luckily we found a private,
another private place. It wasn't

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a public school, but it 
was a music school settlement

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and they had resources
and they were already operating

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under a sort of set of presumptions
about the value of diversity

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and diverse perspectives,
and we didn't really have to ask for much,

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because they bent over backwards
to include my daughter

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in a typical classroom, with her peers,
her preschool peers, music classes,

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there were so many eclectic
movement classes,

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and they even purchased
equipment for their exercise room

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and movement room
that would be useful to her among others,

NOTE Paragraph

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and she has since grown up to become
this teacher and has applied

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to work there as a preschool teacher.
So, I think it would be really

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amazing, if she came full circle. 
But, I guess, to stance the broader

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question about being frustrated and aware 
of inaccessibility and lack of inclusion,

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we were in a district that, when she then,
was about to move to preschool, I

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knew that she wouldn't probably be able to
go to a private school, not only because

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of the financial cost, but because 
they would not have to think about

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best practices and the law when
it came to accommodating

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their students with disabilities,
and so I knew we would be

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looking at the public school,and the 
public school in our neighborhood

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was not accessible. We went to visit it,
the playground had a little house

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that she wouldn't have been 
able to get into,

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and it was really disheartening
and so it came at a time

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when we were already looking
for other opportunities,

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and my husband got an opportunity
to move us as a family

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to the West Coast
of Portland of Oregon,

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so the way I...we had to
navigate her early educational experiences

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was to only look at spaces and schools
that were in districts that were new,

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so that had buildings 
and had training in terms of

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accommodating their diverse students
and their disabled students,

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because just having the brief experiences
that I did with the preschool

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and IEP meetings that were going to
require me to fight at every juncture

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for her basic rights 
to show what she knows

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and participate and recognize herself
as a valuable contributor

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to the school community.
We're not going to be forthcoming

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without a fight, 
and so we narrowed our search

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to a district,
and thank God we had the opportunity

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and the resources to do this,
that was pretty known for their

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inclusivity.

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We did that also when we came back 
to the Cleveland, Ohio area.

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We were able to avoid all districts
that weren't at the cutting edge

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of full inclusion and proof of excellence
and had newer buildings

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that could accommodate those 
with disabilities,

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but I guess that that was my earliest
memory of how, 'Oh, we have a road

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ahead of us and we have to take it upon
ourselves to either continue to fight

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battles that had already been won, 
legislatively or find spaces, places

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and organizations that were ahead
of the curve

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in terms of implementing, monitoring and 
just execute the basic civil rights

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of their various constituents

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The impact that all of that has had on me 
is to just be able to communicate

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with other parents and students 
with disabilities

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about not only knowing their rights but
knowing how to get those rights

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how to advocate for ensuring that those 
rights are addressed, are met.

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I think the ADA has made 
a huge difference

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and the aha moment was even when I was
collating information for this book

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on disability prejudice. I realised that 
when I was a kid,

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when I was growing up in the 60s and 70s, 
people with disabilities weren't able to

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do any of the things that we took for 
granted as kids: go to the movies

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go to restaurants, go to visit a friend,
at a friend's house, or invite

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others to your birthday parties.

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And, since the ADA passed in 1990, 
it wasn't an immediate set of changes,

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as, you know, there has been significant
progress made, particularly in public

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spaces and in employment settings, 
where there are even employers

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who are part of an organization 
of inclusive excellence, who

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recognize that disabled employees are 
actually more reliable and

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have less turnover and are worth
investing in and promoting.

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But, there are still so many places, 
small businesses, educational institutions

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that are not carrying out the basic, 
sort of gains and practices that the ADA

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has made possible .There's just way too 
much variation, and I think part of that

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is just a lack of education in 
terms of what

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is reasonable and what is necessary

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in terms of accommodating your citizenry

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and lack of resources in some cases but

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also a lot of misinformation about whether

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or not it's worth it. The ADA is going to

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be 30 here in July. We're celebrating all

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over the country and we are still fighting

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for businesses to do what they should have

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done 30 years ago, those that have been

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around this long. They have not, they have

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have waited for complaints or they have

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failed to do but the bare minimum in

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terms of recruiting the largest minority

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I work in the education sphere and to me,

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we could be doing so much more with

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advertising and recruiting for those kinds

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of students that we tend to really, at

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least my institution, do well to retain

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because we're a small, intimate college,

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Hiram College. And, and for 
years I've tried to

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encourage us to consider more universally

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designed approaches, but also approaches

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that do more than the bare minimum
when it comes to housing and

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extracurricular accommodations for

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students to who use mobility devices. For

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example, my daughter ended up having to be

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carried in her chair, to various club

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meetings while she was on the Hiram

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College campus. She was told that, 
during the

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winter, when the ice storms came, that

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they couldn't transport her up the long

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hill, while they were
telling everyone

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else to walk like a penguin, and we had

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vans to do this. We had to file with the

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Ohio Disability Rights Commission and

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request that the school thinks about other

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ways of accommodating her, should there

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be a storm, an ice storm, and she can't

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get up to campus.
And the solution

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was to have her move to a
new dorm.

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You can't just do that over night.

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You can't just move all your bedding

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and all your bathroom supplies

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and your whole... you know at the moment's

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notice, when the weather changes

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and so it has been my experience that

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still a lot of places have done
the bare minimum approach

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and think that that's all they need to do

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when instead, they could be following more

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of the latest practices and 
implementation's science

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and making it easier for people to

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register concerns or complaints. And

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they often don't even need to file a

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formal complaint issue, if you 
approach a business or

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your educational institution 
with an issue.

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Often times, progressive thinkers that 
recognize the value of

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customers with disabilities frequenting
their businesses or

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diversifying their faculty or their
student body

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will simply not be aware that they have
failed to accommodate or

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make accessible various programs
and spaces.

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And that can be as simple as asking.
But a lot of times a lot more

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has to be done, you have to document
you have

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to make sure your emails go to
multiple people

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and make the business case of why 
surveying your policies

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to see whether they are biases or whether

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there is discrimination in filing of

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complaints or even you have a title

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of, you know, a (...) officer on campus
or (...) cooridnator

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so that you can let students
with disabilities know

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who may have not proper documentation

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how they can go about making sure that

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they get what they need to show

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what they know, before they fail classes

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because they haven't knocked at the door

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of disability services and provided proof

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that they have a particular condition

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So I know, I am sort of rambling a bit,

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but I just, just wasn't aware of how much

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further we need to go when it comes to

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surveying and making sure that the ADA

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is being implemented and just because

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a law passes doesn't mean again

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that it is just going to happen

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you have to have allies and acitivists

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and insiders working very hard

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to make sure that people are recognizing

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the value of legislation

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which I think, still people are under

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the assumption that it applies to

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people who identify with disabilities but

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I don't think that was even neccesserely

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even the intent of the ADA

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I think it recognizes that people flow

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in and out of abilities and the extent to

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which they are excluded or discriminated

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against, because of their abilities is

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really what this legislation was about

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even having a record of having a

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condition that maybe you no longer have

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or you had it temporarily can mean that

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you might be excluded. If you applied for

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jobs recently, you know, many places

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require a statement. You have to indicate

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based of strict definitions whether you

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have limitations in these major life

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activities that will qualify you as a

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disabled person and I want to believe that

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they are asking these questions, so that

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they can mindfully recruit people with

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disabilities joining their ranks