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Article Provide by the Atlanta Alliance on
Developmental Disabilities
A Leadership Development Program for People with Developmental
Disabilities and Family Members
Brief History of Partners in Policymaking
Partners in Policymaking is an innovative leadership
development program that fosters disability advocacy. It is
uniquely designed to bring together self-advocates (people with
disabilities) and parents or other family members of children with
disabilities, thereby, creating an environment of motivated
learners with multiple perspectives on disability. The program is
founded on the following core values:
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People with disabilities are people first.
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People with disabilities deserve the
dignity of real relationships and choices about
their own lives.
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People with disabilities must be able to enjoy the benefits of the
productivity of work, homes of their choice, and
mobility and access to community life.
Partners in Policymaking is was designed and created in 1987 by
Colleen Wieck, Ph.D., Director of the Minnesota Governor's
Planning Council on Developmental Disabilities, and Ed Skarnulis,
Ph.D., of the Minnesota Department of Human Services. The quality
model of Partners in Policymaking responds to the paradigm shifts
in the disability field. The quality principles have been refined
over time, after being proven and documented. Through
state-of-the-art training from leaders in the field, Partners
learn histories, philosophies, and concrete strategies for
creating systemic change in disability areas.
Systems change is the focus of Partners in Policymaking, to enable
people with disabilities and families to help make far-reaching
changes in the systems that are supposed to serve them. By
influencing policy makers at all levels, systems can become more
responsive, customer friendly, and consumer driven. Personal
change in participants is a by-product of the Partners curriculum.
Some of the topics covered over the nine months of training
include:
Inclusive Education and Community Services
Concept Highlights:
For many years people with disabilities were not allowed to attend
school. "Special" (separate; segregated) schools were developed
when public schools wouldn't accept students with disabilities.
People with disabilities are increasingly attending inclusive
schools. Most states are not doing enough to develop more
inclusive schools. In fact, some disability groups oppose
"inclusion." Brothers and sisters and neighbors should be able to
attend the same neighborhood schools together. You don't help to
support an inclusive world by separating people in different
schools. Integrated schools are better for students with
disabilities and help to promote friendships. Individualization
means: where will the student be taught, what will the student
learn, who can teach, and how can adaptations be made/ Circles of
friends help everyone. Change the methods, change the technology,
and change the environment.
History of the Parent Movement and Community Living Movement
Concept Highlights:
The past has fostered discrimination against people with
disabilities. The past has fostered the segregation of people with
disabilities. Despite some improvements, discrimination and
segregation continue. How people with disabilities have been
treated affects how they have been viewed by others. We need to
look at how services are today and how to make them better. The
parent’s movement has played a major role in improving services
and opportunities. Some professional and advocacy organizations
and self-advocacy groups have helped to improve services. We need
to "dream big" about the way services should be. We need to
support inclusion, participation, choice, and full citizenship. We
need to work together to make things better.
Employment Opportunities for People with Disabilities
Concept Highlights:
Employment gives workers self-esteem. Employment can contribute to
productivity and happiness. The unemployment rate for people with
disabilities is 72%; of those, 67% want to work. Only one in every
four of all Americans with disabilities has a full-time job.
Employers generally feel that people with disabilities are good
employees. Workers with disabilities may be more reliable on the
job than many workers without disabilities. Supported employment
is a way to help people with more severe disabilities get and
maintain a job. Segregated work settings are being phased-out.
Productive work helps people achieve independence. Employment
promotes empowerment and choice. Employment increases the number
of Americans paying taxes.
Independent Living
Concept Highlights:
The majority of people with developmental disabilities have always
lived at home with their families or on their own. Children with
disabilities have the same rights as all children to grow up in
the security of a nurturing family home. Family support means a
commitment to do whatever it takes to assist families of children
with disabilities to live as a family. People with disabilities
need to be able to move out of the family home and establish their
own identity as adults. Control over your own life-particularly
where and how you choose to live is essential to the definition of
adulthood in modern America. Despite great progress, reform
efforts of the last 30 years continue to place control in the
hands of human service organizations. Support of families and for
adults requires a new role for human services built on a
problem-solving partnership and recognition of the primacy of
consumer control. Providing an array of supports for daily living
is far different from a continuum of residential options or
developing individualized services plans. "Supported living"
provides a useful framework for exploring how housing can be
separated from supports. Individuals with the most severe
disabilities can be supported in their own homes. Housing must be
separated from supports.
Whole Life Planning
Concept Highlights:
"Whole Life Planning" is a way of looking at people in terms of
their whole life. It looks at the whole person and at capacity
building. It's also referred to as personal futures planning,
lifestyle planning, and functional planning. None of us are just a
label. We all have strengths, wants, needs, likes, and dislikes.
Families and professionals and advocates need to understand whole
life planning. Seeing a person in terms of their strengths and
potential can help to develop that potential. What are your
dreams? What are your nightmares? Who is committed to assisting
you? Take off the "filters" of disability. Having friends and
being happy and doing things that you want to do can help to
expand your life.
Assistive Technology
Concept Highlights:
Technology can assist a person who may have a functional
limitation. It can help people to see, to hear, to move around, to
communicate, to work, and to live more independently. Technology
is not always affordable or accessible for many people who could
benefit from it. Technology has helped us to learn how capable
some people are. More people need to hear the success stories.
Policymakers need to understand how assistive technology can save
money by fostering independence and by helping people to have
jobs. Professionals and parents and consumers need to understand
what is possible. People need to be strong and clear in their
advocacy for the increased availability of assistive technology.
Technology accommodates functional limitations.
Effective Advocacy Strategies and Grassroots Organizing
Concept Highlights:
We need to know what is possible. We need to define the issues. We
need to develop a vision. We need to work together. We need to
involve elected officials. We need to clearly communicate with
policymakers about what needs to be done, what is possible, what's
right and what's wrong. We need to involve the media. We need to
know what advocacy organizations exist (possibly to work with).
Consumers need to be a part of it. We need to know how to run
meetings. We should learn how to organize. We need to be creative.
We need to be persistent. We need to win!
Commitment
Upon completion the Partner will have evolved from a person
interested in disability issues to an advocate armed with the
tools to effect systems change. The
expectation after graduation is that each partner will continue to
be committed to actively using the skills he or she has learned to
impact community awareness, sensitivity, accessibility, and
inclusion. Ongoing support is provided through the Partners in
Policymaking Graduate Program. The graduate program will support
Partners by providing opportunities for additional training,
networking, and communication of ideas, issues, and interests of
Partners Alumni.
Explanation of how to apply to be in Partners in Policymaking
Partners are selected through an application process occurring
annually in the spring. Selections are made by an independent
committee of past graduates in the summer. Upon selection, the
Partner will commit to participating in eight two-day training
sessions. These sessions are held monthly on weekends beginning in
September and ending in May of the following year (no session is
held during the month of December). The program is designed to
empower and educate the participant about current issues, best
practices, policymaking and the legislative process. Experts on
disability issues will present information on disability law,
employment, education, housing, Social Security, Medicaid, and
healthcare issues. Throughout the program, the importance of
concepts such as self-determination, inclusion, and futures
planning are emphasized. Partners work on communication skills,
persuasion and negotiation skills, and decision-making skills.
They will have the opportunity to make contacts, form networks,
and attain effective advocacy strategies.
Here is what Alumni are saying:
Being a Partners graduate has opened up doors I didn't know
existed, helped me strive for the light at the end of the tunnel,
and enhanced my life and the life of my family, broadened my
horizons, engaged new friendships and opportunities, enhanced and
enriched my community, and taken me to a better place in life. For
that I thank Partners for the educational opportunity they
provided. Kathy Colberg,
Partners Graduate 1996
Partners in Policymaking gave me the vision, taught me the skills
and showed me the many pathways to become an agent for change.
Anne Ladd, Partners Graduate 1998
Partners to me has and continues to support me in my advocacy work
by knowing that there are 35 others partners that I can call on
anytime across the state for service and support in anything that
I do. Thank you, Partners.
Mary Miles, Partners Graduate 1998
My education through Partners made it possible for me to stand up
for myself and my son in our fight against mental illness. Today
at the request of the Mental Health Association of Georgia, Scott
and I did an interview for the 11 pm news about people with mental
disabilities. We want people to know that there are people with
mental illness functioning well in society. I could never have
done the interview if I had not gone to Partners and learned to
advocate. I will always be grateful to Partners for that.
Barbara Sheheane, Partners Graduate 1998
Partners has empowered me, has educated me about "system change,"
and has helped me formulate a powerful positive vision for people
and families with disabilities.
GiGi Taylor, Partners Graduate 1999
In Asher's first IEP meeting two years ago, I was asked how did I
know so much and some parents knew nothing. I proudly stated that
I am a graduate of Partners, a leadership training course that
changes your life, one setting, one weekend, one friend, one
speaker, one assignment at a time.
Edith Abakare, Partners Graduate 1999
Thank you so much for this past year of learning more about
disabilities. You truly have opened my eyes and also given me
confidence in myself that I can make a difference.
Gloria Dodd, Partners Graduate
2000
I have walked away with so much knowledge. If I didn't learn it
while sitting through the training sessions, I learned it by
listening to my constituents. I am willing to do anything to
assist a parent of a child with a disability or an adult. After
all, this is what Partners has taught me! Whoever thought of this
program deserves a great award!
LaVon M. Gainey, Partners Graduate 2000
The class is designed to empower and boy does it ever! I wanted to
learn and learn I did. If I can do anything to help other parents
by making the path they walk down a little easier, I want to be
there to help. Even if it is one starfish at a time.
Diane Frey, Partners Graduate 2002
For more information on Partners in Policymaking,
please contact
David Blanchard.
or
Atlanta Alliance on Developmental Disabilities
Attention: Partners in Policymaking
1440 Dutch Valley Place - Suite 200
Atlanta, GA 30324-5302
Fax: 404-881-0094
Telephone: 404-881-9777, x 215
TTY Users: 1-800-255-0056 (Georgia Relay Center)
Voice: 1-800-255-0135
STS English: 1-800-229-5746
STS Spanish: 1-866-260-9470
Partners in Policymaking is funded by the Governor's Council on
Developmental Disabilities for Georgia with the support of the
Atlanta Alliance on Developmental Disabilities and the United Way
of Metropolitan Atlanta
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“The only pure and consistent advocates for a child are his or her parents
or family members,” explains Betsy Primm, coordinator of Georgia Learning
Resource Services Metro-North branch. “That doesn’t mean that educators
don’t advocate every day for their students, but year in and year out, that
is a parent’s role.” |
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