Shifting Our View: A Person-Centered Journey

/in , , /by The Arc

In this webinar, Lori Ropa, Executive Director of The Arc of Jefferson, Clear Creek, and Gilpin Counties, discusses how she embarked on a journey with their advocacy team during COVID to “shift their views” and attempted to understand the thoughts and feelings of the people who came to support them. Lori’s team developed personas and mapped people’s journeys through The Arc through the lens of each persona. They then developed actionable items to make the advocacy experience even more positive for the people coming to their organization for support.

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Restrained and Secluded: How a Change in Perspective for Students With Disabilities and Simple Science Can Change Everything

/in , , , , , /by The Arc

Students with disabilities are more likely to be restrained, secluded, suspended, expelled, and subjected to corporal punishment. In the name of behavior, children with disabilities, Black and brown children, and children with a trauma history are often misunderstood. Outdated behavioral management approaches are not working for the children who need our help the most. Being the parent or caregiver of a misunderstood child can be difficult. We are often blamed and shamed, but there is hope. A bit of neuroscience and a new lens on behavior can reduce and eliminate punitive practices and lead to endless potential.

Speaker Bio: Guy Stephens lives in Southern Maryland with his wife and two amazing children. He is the founder and Executive Director of the nonprofit Alliance Against Seclusion and Restraint (AASR). AASR is a community of over 25,000 parents, self-advocates, teachers, school administrators, paraprofessionals, attorneys, related service providers, and others working together to influence change in supporting children whose behaviors are often misunderstood. He has presented at conferences and events across North America and guest lectures for undergraduate and graduate courses as a national expert on the issue of restraint and seclusion.

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Download transcript here.

For further questions, please email school@thearc.org.

2023 Talk About Sexual Violence Final Report: Transforming Health Care to Address Sexual Violence of People With IDD

/in , , , , , , /by The Arc

In this video, Leigh Anne McKingsley, Senior Director of The Arc’s National Center on Criminal Justice and Disability, and Kecia Weller, Survivor Self-Advocate and Project Advisor, provide an overview of the key findings and recommendations of the Talk About Sexual Violence project over the past seven years.

FINDS Community Report 2023: Family & Individual Needs for Disability Supports

/in , , , , , , /by The Arc

The Family and Individual Needs for Disability Supports (FINDS) survey provides insights and understanding of the experiences of families supporting a family member with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). It is critical research to inform better policy development.

The FINDS survey was initially conducted by The Arc of the United States in 2010. It was updated in 2017 through a collaboration between the Research and Training Center on Community Living (RTC/CL) at the University of Minnesota and The Arc.

The 2023 report focused on:

  1. What are the challenges families face in meeting the support needs of their family members?
  2. What are the economic implications of caregiving?
  3. How does caregiving affect caregivers, and what supports do they need?

A better understanding of the experiences and needs of caregivers can help policymakers and others support caregivers in this critical role.

Jacobs v. Salt Lake City School District

/in , , /by The Arc

Filed: September 29, 2023

Court: Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals

Overview: Amicus brief explaining that children with disabilities must have access to education in their neighborhood schools.

Excerpt: “The ruling below is flatly inconsistent with the IDEA and case law interpreting its least restrictive environment (LRE) mandate. Congress has made clear through IDEA (in all its iterations over the past five decades) that one of its overriding priorities was giving students with disabilities access to the general education curriculum and education in the regular classroom to the maximum extent possible. Congress enacted IDEA, an “ambitious piece of legislation,” in response to the serious problem that a “majority of handicapped children in the United States were either totally excluded from schools or [were] sitting idly in regular classrooms awaiting the time when they were old enough to drop out.” Endrew F. v. Douglas Cnty. Sch. Dist. RE-1, 580 U.S. 386, 397 (2017) (internal quotation marks and citations omitted)… IDEA’s mandates are not empty aspirations: decades of scientifically based research demonstrates that children with disabilities achieve considerably more educational benefit from placement in general education classes with access to the general education curriculum through supplementary aids and services than from placement in special education classrooms or schools with limited access or no access to their age-appropriate non-disabled peers or general education curriculum.”

Case Documents

Jacobs v. Salt Lake City School District Amicus Brief

Ybarra v. Gittere et. al.

/in /by The Arc

Filed: August 29, 2023

Court: Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals

Overview: Amicus brief in a death penalty case filed to prevent a man with an intellectual disability from facing execution.

Excerpt: “Relying on stereotypes or lay assumptions about what a person with ID “must” look like, or what people with ID “cannot” do, rather than applying clinical standards for assessment and diagnosis may result in an unreasonable (and invalid) interpretation of the diagnostic facts in an Atkins evaluation. See, e.g., Brumfield v. Cain, 576 U.S. 305, 312-320 (2015) (finding an unreasonable interpretation of the facts where a state court abandoned clinical standards in determining that an individual was ineligible for an Atkins adjudication). In this context, a clinically invalid assessment risks execution of an individual with ID, a clear Constitutional violation.”

Case Documents

Ybarra v. Gittere et. al. Amicus Brief

The Arc’s Congressional Leave-Behind for the HCBS Relief Act

/in , , , , , /by The Arc

The Home and Community Based Services (HCBS) Relief Act of 2023 was introduced in Congress by Senator Bob Casey (D-PA) and Representative Debbie Dingell (D-MI). The bill would provide two years of additional Medicaid funds to improve access to HCBS by increasing direct care worker pay and benefits; decrease the number of people on waiting lists for HCBS; and pay for assistive technologies, staffing, and other costs that facilitate community integration.

Griffith v. El Paso County Colorado

/in /by The Arc

Filed: August 25, 2023

Court: Tenth Circuit Court of Appeals

Overview: Amicus brief filed explaining that people with disabilities, including people who identify as having gender dysphoria, are not required to show that their exact disability is well-settled across the courts and are entitled to compensatory damages for emotional distress under Title II of the ADA.

Excerpt: “[T]he court erroneously posited that a defendant can be shielded from liability for damages for intentional discrimination based on a contention that one of the elements of the plaintiff’s claim—here, whether the Plaintiff was legally disabled—was unsettled. If permitted to stand, the district court’s analysis will allow entities free rein to discriminate unless and until all courts agree a condition is a covered disability. This will severely weaken enforcement of the ADA… In Cummings, the Supreme Court addressed the very limited question of whether emotional distress damages are available under Section 504 and Section 1557 of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, 42 U.S.C. § 18116 (“Section 1557″)… The expansion of Cummings’ bar on emotional distress damages to Title II of the ADA would eliminate an essential remedy that Congress intended to make available to victims of disability discrimination when the ADA was enacted.”

Case Documents

Griffith v. El Paso County Colorado Amicus Brief

Acheson Hotels, LLC v. Laufer

/in /by The Arc

Filed: August 9, 2023

Court: Supreme Court of the United States

Overview: Amicus brief filed in case before the Supreme Court that will decide whether testers – disabled people who investigate compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) – have the ability to sue businesses for discrimination when their rights under that law are violated.

Excerpt: “Under the Reservation Rule, information about hotel accessibility features must be posted on hotel websites. 28 C.F.R. § 36.302(e)(1). Unfortunately, despite the 1990 enactment of the ADA and 2010 promulgation of the Reservation Rule, people with disabilities regularly encounter inaccurate or incomplete information, or no information at all, when they attempt to ascertain a hotel’s accessibility features online. The message these individuals receive during these encounters is that their patronage is less valuable and desirable than the patronage of nondisabled guests because the public accommodation did not consider disabled people among its potential customers…By making the apparently advantageous business decision to share information about its hotels with a much larger audience over the Internet, while simultaneously failing to provide the accessibility information that disabled members of that audience need in order to be treated equally…Acheson is discriminating against every disabled person who encounters that noncompliant online reservations service. Each of these individuals— interacting with this noncompliant reservations service — could suffer their own concrete and particularized injury: the dignitary harm of disregard and erasure that Title III was enacted to prevent.”

Case Documents

Disability Antidiscrimination Law Scholars Amicus Brief

Disability Rights Groups Amicus Brief

Press Release

Amicus Brief Filed in U.S. Supreme Court Case Emphasizes Importance of Testers to ADA Enforcement

Related Media

Disability Scoop: Disability Advocates Urge Supreme Court Not to Limit ADA Protections

USA Today: ‘Sleeping in my car.’ This Supreme Court Case Could Change How Disabled Americans Book Hotel Rooms

Slate: The Americans With Disabilities Act Is Under Threat at the Supreme Court