Disability Matters

Representatives from the Youth Council of the National Epilepsy Foundation will discuss how the Foundation will reach out to both young people with epilepsy and young people who do not have epilepsy.

Joyce welcomes Eric Hargis, president and CEO of the National Epilepsy Foundation and Darla Templeton, executive vice president of the Epilepsy Foundation of the St. Louis Region. This show begins a two-year series where executive directors of Epilepsy Foundation, affiliates and the national office talk about how people with epilepsy can be helped by working together.

Joyce welcomes Michael Strautmanis, Senior Counsel, to the Obama-Biden Campaign and another campaign representative. Discussed on the show will be Barack Obama's disability policy.

Joyce welcomes Donny Weber, deputy chief of recruitment and staffing, as well as other representatives from the National Security Agency (NSA). Discussed on the show will be the agency's commitment to hiring people with disabilities.

Joyce welcomes Kareem Dale, The National Disability Director for the Obama Campaign. Discussed on the show will be his success founding the Dale Law Group, as a person with a disability, and Senator Obama's views on the employment of Americans with disabilities. www.barackobama.com/issues/disabilities

Joyce's honored guests are Tony Coelho, author of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), and Sandy Finucane, vice president of legal & government affairs for the National Epilepsy Foundation. Discussed on the show will be both of their extraordinary efforts to get the ADA Amendments Act signed into law, which restores the ADA to its original intent when signed into law in 1990. The ADA Amendments Act was signed by President Bush on September 25, 2008 at the White House.

Joyce welcomes Sally Atwater, executive director of the President's Committee for People with Intellectual Disabilities, as her guest. Topics on the show will range from her past work with former President George H.W. Bush and her experience at the National Advisory for Neurological Disorders and Stroke Council at the National Institutes of Health, to her views on how people with intellectual disabilities are vital members of the community.

Joyce welcomes Cindy Mancuso, career counselor and diversity advisor at Canada's McGill University, Deborah L. Kennard, founder and board member of the Metropolitan Montreal Independent Living Resource Centre and Bob White, its acting executive director. Discussed on the show will be working for freedom and independence in Montreal, as well as a discussion of the McGill University programs and the Independent Living Center programs.

Joyce welcomes Nan Hawthorne, author of the book, An Involuntary King: A Tale of Anglo Saxon England on Disability Matters with Joyce Bender. This author who is blind will discuss her book on the show and Bookshare.org. Bookshare.org believes that people with print disabilities deserve the same ease of access to books and periodicals that people without disabilities enjoy. The Bookshare.org library provides print disabled people in the United States with legal access to over 40,600 books and 150 periodicals that are converted to Braille, large print or digital formats for text to speech audio.

Joyce welcomes Jenna Martin, Western Bureau Director of Media Services for One Economy Corporation on Disability Matters with Joyce Bender. Discussed on the show will be the One Economy Corporation and their disability work.