Judy Heumann, a renowned activist who helped secure legislation protecting the rights of people with disabilities, has died at age 75.
The Associated Press
She spent the rest of her life fighting, first to get access for herself and then for others, her brother recalled. Heumann has been called the “mother of the disability rights movement” for her longtime advocacy on behalf of disabled people through protests and legal action, her website says., Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and the Rehabilitation Act. She served as the assistant secretary of the U.S. Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation Services, beginning in 1993 in the Clinton administration, until 2001.
Heumann, who was born in Philadelphia in 1947 and raised in New York City, was the co-author of her memoir, “Being Heumann,” and a version for young adults titled, “Rolling Warrior.” “Today the expectation for children with disabilities is that we will be included in mainstream education, that we will have a chance to go to high school, to go to college and to get those degrees,” Town said while acknowledging that inequities persist. “But I think the fact that the primary assumption has changed is a really big deal, and I also think Judy played a significant role.
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