Disability Rights and the Legacy of Judy Heumann’s Activism

This mini-lesson is designed to be adaptable. You can use the activities in sequence or choose a selection best suited to your classroom. It includes:

• 4 activities
• Student-facing slides

Share the following information with your students about how the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) defines disability:

A person with a disability is someone who:

• has a physical or mental impairment that substantially limits one or more major life activities,
• has a history or record of such an impairment (such as cancer that is in remission), or
• is perceived by others as having such an impairment (such as a person who has scars from a severe burn).

There is a wide variety of disabilities, and the ADA regulations do not list all of them. Some disabilities are visible and some are not. Some examples of disabilities include:

• Cancer
• Diabetes
• Post-traumatic stress disorder
• HIV
• Autism
• Cerebral palsy
• Deafness or hearing loss
• Blindness or low vision
• Epilepsy
• Mobility disabilities such as those requiring the use of a wheelchair, walker, or cane
• Intellectual disabilities
• Major depressive disorder
• Traumatic brain injury ¹

Then, read the following quote as a class:

In her memoir Rolling Warrior, disability rights activist Judy Heumann writes: “Our disabilities weren’t medical problems that we were going to ‘fix.’ Our problem was with society. From our perspective, disability was something that could happen to anyone at any time, and frequently did, so it was the right thing for society to expect it and design for it.” ²

Ask your students to discuss the following questions in small groups:

• What is the difference between viewing an individual’s disability as a problem and viewing society’s lack of inclusive design as a problem?
• What would our school look and feel like if it were designed with the needs of everyone in mind?

Once students have finished discussing, ask each student to share a word or phrase in response to the second question, using the Wraparound strategy. Ask your students:

• What responses stood out to you and why?
• What trends did you hear in the responses?

• 1 “Introduction to the Americans with Disabilities Act,” Americans with Disabilities Act, accessed March 24, 2023.
• 2Judith Heumann and Kristen Joiner, Rolling Warrior: The Incredible, Sometimes Awkward, True Story of a Rebel Girl on Wheels Who Helped Spark a Revolution (Boston: Beacon Press, 2021), 41.

Tell your students that they are going to watch a clip from a TED talk given by Judy Heumann. Share the following information, which can also be found in the Slides for this mini-lesson, with your students:

Judy Heumann was born in 1947, and contracted polio when she was 18 months old. She used a wheelchair throughout her life as a result of the illness. Judy Heumann was an activist for disability rights throughout her life, and passed away recently, on March 4, 2023.

Judy Heumann references two laws in the clip you will watch: 

• the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, which contains a section that prohibits places or organizations that receive federal funding from discriminating against individuals with disabilities, and

• the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990, which prohibits discriminating against individuals with disabilities in all aspects of public life, including employment, education, transportation, and buildings open to the public.

Play the video Our fight for disability rights — and why we're not done yet from 1:32-12:40. As students watch, ask them to note down information that can help them answer the following questions:

• What are some challenges Judy Heumann faced as a result of other people’s perceptions of her? What are some challenges Judy faced as a result of the physical infrastructure around her?
• What strategies did Judy Heumann use to create change, both in her own life and for others? 
• What are some examples of laws and regulations affecting people with disabilities that changed throughout Judy Heumann’s lifetime?

After students watch the clip, give them a few minutes to finish answering the questions individually. Then, ask for volunteers to share their responses with the class.

Share the following information and quote with your students, which can also be found in the Slides for this mini-lesson:

Imani Barbarin is a disability representation and inclusion advocate who was born with cerebral palsy, who grew up after the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was passed in 1990. She said in an interview with NPR in 2020: "I think the ADA is really good at codifying and making written into law equal opportunity, but it didn't really do much to change perceptions about disability.”

Then, ask your students to work together in pairs to answer the following questions:

• Brainstorm some examples of how you have seen disability portrayed in movies, books, or on social media. Which examples (if any) reinforce stereotypes about disability? Which examples (if any) challenge common representations of disability? 
• What do you think it would take to change people’s perceptions of disability?

Share the following information and quote with your students, which can also be found in the Slides for this mini-lesson:

Imani Barbarin is a disability representation and inclusion advocate who was born with cerebral palsy, who grew up after the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) was passed in 1990. In a 2020 interview with NPR, she remarked on how quickly work and education became accessible at the beginning of the COVID pandemic: "One of the things that we are witnessing as disabled people, as a disabled community, during this pandemic is how everything became accessible almost overnight … People started teleworking and going to Zoom classrooms and getting their education remotely."

Ask students to discuss the following prompt using the Think, Pair, Share strategy:

Why do you think institutions offered accessibility options during the beginning of the pandemic that they had not offered to people with disabilities before? What does this say about whose needs are prioritized in American society?

Then, read the following quote as a class:

In her memoir Rolling Warrior, disability rights activist Judy Heumann writes: “Part of the problem is that we tend to think that equality is about treating everyone the same, when it’s not. It’s about fairness. It’s about equity of access.”  (Judith Heumann and Kristen Joiner, Rolling Warrior: The Incredible, Sometimes Awkward, True Story of a Rebel Girl on Wheels Who Helped Spark a Revolution (Boston: Beacon Press, 2021), 153)

Ask for 2-3 volunteers to answer the following question:

How is “equity of access” different from “treating everyone the same”? 

Then, divide your class into small groups of 3-4 students. Assign each group to focus on one aspect of our society, such as: public transportation, social media platforms, places of business, public parks. Then, ask them to brainstorm ideas with their groups in response to the prompt below. You can give students the option of including a visual component in their responses.

What would this aspect of our society look like if equity of access were the goal? 

Finally, ask one student from each group to share their ideas with the class.