Where:

Renaissance Baltimore Harborplace Hotel 202 East Pratt Street Baltimore, Maryland 21202 Special Conference Rate! $169 Single or Double

Registration Rates Hotel Reservations

2010 Reinventing Quality Conference Video

2012 Plenary Speakers

Full List of Speakers

Monday's Plenary Session

Dale DiLeo has provided training throughout the US, Canada, and Europe on community inclusion for persons with disabilities. He is the Past President of the Association for Persons in Supported Employment (APSE), and is the lead author of that organization’s highly respected Ethical Guidelines in Supported Employment. He is the author of Employment First: Building a Culture that Expects Job Success and the founder of TRN, Inc. a company that provides training materials. His book, Raymond’s Room, focuses on ending the shameful segregation of people with disabilities in community life. Here is what Al Condeluci, Executive Director of UCP of Pittsburgh said about Dale’s book, Raymond’s Room: “For far too long we’ve been willing to accept the small gains experienced by folks with disabilities as acceptable. Raymond's Room, by Dale DiLeo, kicks the door of acceptability back open. This book will cause all of us to rethink our roles in building full community opportunities for all people. This book puts reality right back in our faces. It raises consciousness, ignites passions and brings the spirit back into our work. If you have forgotten the story that got you interested in disability issues, this book will be your awakening.” Dale will kick off the conference with his reflections on the past and inspiring views of the future of the movement toward fully included lives.

Panel: Heroes of the Movement

Val Bradley, President of the Human Services Research Institute will moderate the Heroes of the Movement Panel. Val’s interest in disability reform has been manifest in her involvement quality improvement, family support, deinstitutionalization, and performance measurement. Her career has been dedicated to a commitment to the quality of community services and supports. She has served as the Chair of the President’s Committee on People with Intellectual Disabilities under President Clinton and as President of the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities.

Thomas Gilhool, JD, is a retired staff attorney from the Public Interest Law Center of Philadelphia (PILCOP). He has been the lead attorney in precedent-setting lawsuits on behalf of people with disabilities. Gilhool was an attorney with PILCOP for 27 years. He retired in 2006 after being active in the public interest community for 41 years. Gilhool's accomplishments include his pioneering representation of plaintiffs in PARC v. Commonwealth, which established the constitutional right of children with disabilities to a free, appropriate public education. This decision was the source of the first federal civil rights acts in this area: Section 504 of the Civil Rights Act of 1973 and what is now the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA). In 1990 Gilhool developed a coalition of legal services organizations to enforce a new provision of the Social Security Act, which required states receiving federal funds to provide basic health care to children enrolled in Medicaid.

Teresa Moore is a long-time leader of the self-advocacy movement. She has been a member of the Board of Directors of Self-Advocates Becoming Empowered (SABE), a facilitator for Project Leadership, a coordinator of the MY Voice, My Choice Project, a Coordinator of the Vote Education and VOTE Projects. She works for the National Technical Assistance Center for Voting and Cognitive Access. Teresa is also Chief Editor of “The Riot!, a newsletter and blog housed at the Human Services Research Institute where self-advocates can share opinions, an online art gallery, toolkits, games and services to help individuals become stronger self-advocates.

Beth Mount is a national consultant working with programs throughout the United States to support others to see capacities in people with disabilities. Her groundbreaking work related to Personal Futures Planning promotes the positive futures and images of people with disabilities throughout the world and demonstrates that all of us count and all of us fit. In 1981, she founded her consulting organization, Graphic Futures, to establish transformational innovation projects that create new options for people through personal, organizational, and policy change. For 40 years, Beth has worked toward the ideal that every person with a disability can be a valued member of community life. She has collaborated on more than 100 publications and artworks that tell stories of imagining and implementing positive futures for people with disabilities. Her efforts demonstrate that communities can support the contributions of people with disabilities, and that organizations can adapt to be more person-centered.

John O’Brien is a Principal of Responsive Systems Associates. He is a visionary leader working on projects involving a network of people who cooperate in building local capacity to include people with substantial disabilities in all aspects of community life. Projects focus on facilitating planning that improves our ability to listen and respond, for people and their families, agencies, service systems, and governments; assisting innovators to evaluate programs and policies that open new opportunities for community participation and choice; helping people reflect on the meaning of providing personal assistance and the work of designing and leading agencies that reveal and support capacities and mutual contributions; and supporting people to communicate what they are learning from their lives and their work.

Tuesday's Plenary Session

Sharon Lewis, Commissioner, Administration on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities, Administration for Community Living, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Sharon Lewis was appointed by President Obama to serve as Commissioner of the Administration on Developmental Disabilities in March 2010, where she works on ensuring that people with disabilities have the opportunity to fully participate in all aspects of community living, including employment, education, and healthcare. Prior to her appointment, she served as the Senior Disability Policy Advisor to U.S. House Committee on Education & Labor, as a Kennedy Public Policy Fellow for U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Children & Families, and worked in Oregon on DD policy. She is parent to three daughters, one of whom experiences a developmental disability and is becoming a strong self-advocate in her own right. Public Policy Fellow for U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Children & Families. Sharon is the recipient of numerous awards, including the 2010 Distinguished Leadership in National Disability Policy Award and the Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities Chairman's Award.

Clarence J. Sundram, JD, is a nationally recognized expert on conditions in institutions and community programs for persons with disabilities. He is the Special Advisor to the Governor of New York for Vulnerable Persons and also serves as the Special Master & Court Monitor in class action lawsuits in Washington, DC involving the rights of persons with disabilities. For 20 years, Mr. Sundram served as the founding Chairman of the New York State Commission on Quality of Care and Advocacy for Persons with Disabilities, an independent state oversight agency charged with advising the governor and legislature, investigating deaths, child abuse, patient abuse, financial fraud and abuse in programs serving persons with mental disabilities. Mr. Sundram has also served as Vice-Chairman of the New York State Developmental Disabilities Planning Council, and as a member of the Board of Directors the National Disability Rights Network. He has consulted in over 20 states and Canadian provinces, and for the U.S. Department of Justice on issues of protection from abuse, neglect and exploitation; restraint and seclusion; Quality Assurance and risk management. Clarence’s presentation is titled, “With the Best of Intentions: The unintended consequences of community systems.” He will discuss the infrastructure needed to assure quality as we move to more independent supports .

David Hingsburger will speak about rights as something importantly personal. David works providing direct service to people with intellectual disabilities. He is the Director of Clinical and Educational Services for Vita Community Living Services and a primary consultant for the Sexuality Clinic at York Simcoe Behaviour Management Services. Dave also works in private practice as a consultant for schools, parents and agencies. He has published over 30 books and numerous articles in magazines, newspapers and journals. Dave wrote and narrated the controversial radio documentary “Life, Death and Disability” for the CBC. Dave lectures extensively. He has given keynote presentations nationally and internationally. In the fall of 2009, Dave was inducted into the Canadian Disability Hall of Fame.

Ricardo Thornton is an outspoken advocate for people’s right to live lives of their own choosing and design. He is a clerk at the Martin Luther King, Jr. Memorial Library in Washington, D.C. Ricardo began by volunteering at the library 32 years ago as part of a special education program. Early on he worked with a job coach but soon he became a full-time paid employee. A vocal self- advocate, dedicated husband and father, athlete and ambassador, Ricardo speaks passionately about the importance of full participation and self-determination for people with developmental disabilities. He will challenge us to continue the move toward quality and full community inclusion for all.

Special Pre-Conference Session on Shared Living!

In today’s economy, how do you support someone who requires significant supports in a way that offers community inclusion, a home of one’s choice and good people with whom to share a full life? Shared Living accomplishes this and more!

Please join us for this one-day special session on Shared Living offered as a pre-conference session to the Reinventing Quality Conference. The Full Day Shared Living Event will be held on August 5, 2012 from 10:00 a.m. through 4:00 p.m. The cost is $50.
More information
Shared Living Session Agenda

2012 Conference Strand Topics

• Improving Quality through Managed Care
• Supporting Individuals by Strengthening Families
• Shared Living
• Self Advocacy
• Transition Issues
• The Journey from Traditional Services to Person-Centered Supports
• Housing: The Key to Community Living
• Person Centered Practice -- It's Not What You Think!
• Supporting Communities That Welcome All People - Asset Based Community Development
• Federal Initiatives to Expand and Improve Supports for People with Disabilities
• Re-thinking Supports for Individuals with Behavioral Health Needs
• Technology
• Direct Support Workforce Issues
• Employment Issues
• Evolving a Shared Research Agenda
• Quality Management Challenges and Solutions
• Evidence Based Policy: What Does the Research Tell Us about Public Policy?
• View Strand Descriptions

The National Association of State Directors of Developmental Disabilities Services, the Research and Training Center on Community Living at the University of Minnesota, the Human Services Research Institute and The University of Delaware's National Leadership Consortium come together to organize the Reinventing Quality Conference. This year the conference is additionally supported by the following Partnering Organizations:

• NADD
• The Arc of the Central Chesapeake Region
• ANCOR
• Project ACTION!
• DC Department on Disability Services
• Maryland Association of Community Services (MACS)
• The Coordinating Center
• Delaware Division of Developmental Disabilities
• People on the Go - Maryland