Joe Damiano with Tom Hyland of Rep Tom Reed’s Office (left) and Melanie Ryan, Disability Coordinator for Alfred State College (right).
Joe Damiano, Chair of the Collaborative’s Self Advocates Team recently completed the Self Advocacy of NYS educational program, The School of Grassroots Advocacy. Congrats Joe! Graduates who joined Joe D on stage at Alfred State College were Jeremy Brooks, Sara Dibiase, Alicia Hodgson, Sherri Merrell, Brittany Smith and Adam Waasdorp.
According to SANYS, the program’s curriculum is designed to “give individuals with disabilities and direct support professionals a more thorough understanding of the important subject of self-advocacy and help develop future leaders for the self-advocacy movement”.
Sessions include:
- Introduction to Self-Advocacy & Leadership Development
- History of Disability Rights & Self-Advocacy Leadership
- Your Individual Rights & Responsibilities
- Tips for Strong Self-Advocacy Groups
- Self-Advocacy Leadership Skills
- You and Your One Wild Precious Life!
- Advocate for What You Want!
- You are Community!
- What Are Some Current Self-Advocacy Issues?
- Games, Leadership Projects & Graduation
The graduation event included important thoughtful speeches by The Collaborative’s own Mike Damiano (Board member) and Joanne LaForge (Quality member). Essence Jackson and Sophia Roberts provided the insight to the Grassroots Advocacy program, “SANYS U” and the goals of the self advocacy movement. And real applause goes out to everyone involved in the program: the College’s R.I.S.E. PM, Kathy Newton, teachers Jessica Levesque and Mike Rogers (along with Jackson and Roberts) and assistants Louise Jordan and Pamela Guinnip.
Moving advocacy forward one person at a time or in the case of the Aug 19, 2016 graduation at Alfred State, 7 people at a time! Congrats to all!
