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This is a photograph of Jennifer Patterson (right) and her mother Dixie. Jennifer is shown in the first apartment she lived in on her own, in Bloomington, Indiana. The photo was taken on July 2, 2000.

"Jennifer really wanted to move so she kind of pushed it, and we did it and she was very excited." Dixie Patterson talks about her daughter moving into her first apartment at the age of 29 in 2000. Dixie says it was a bigger transition for her and…

"Even though professionals are very good and a lot of times very empathetic, it's still not the same as having lived it 24 hours a day." As both a parent of an adult daughter with intellectual/developmental disabilities and a retired disability…

“They asked me to work on the objective of developing an Arc in every county in Indiana,” says Don Melloy. Don would take off after to work to travel around the state meeting with parents and community members. He would discuss the benefits of…

“I found in going around the state and meeting with organizations, they didn't want to talk to one another," states Don Melloy of his experience in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s in organizing Arc chapters in Indiana. The original focus of The Arc was…

“Forty-seven years ago I gave birth to a child who was born with multiple disabilities. This was back in New Hampshire. It was before there were any laws about education or anything. And I found problems getting services for her. They wouldn't let…

"I joke with everybody that I take a day, I sit at home with a two-liter bottle of Diet Pepsi and a huge box of tissues and I read all the essays,” recounts Donna about the Attitude Essay Contest. The contest encourages elementary and middle school…

“It's an interesting question to ask, how I got interested in the field of disability services,” states Dr. Mary Ciccarelli. When Dr. Ciccarelli began her training in the late ‘70s, early ‘80s, there was little specific attention paid to…

“I have a servant's mentality… so what do I do? Well, now my focus is on helping families with young children with disabilities and as they go up through the school system, how do you get supports after age 22.” Erika Steuterman has two daughters…

"I'm one who has educational conversations about dwarfism with the world." In this excerpt from a 2017 interview, Columbus, Indiana resident Ethan Crough discusses the portrayal of people with dwarfism in popular media, depictions that have…