Programming for the University’s first Disability Awareness Month will include five activities designed to recognize social and cultural contributions made by people with disabilities, and to increase campus awareness of the changes still needed to create equal opportunities and an inclusive environment.
October 1, 4:30 – 6: 00 p.m.
Kogod Theatre, Clarice
Smith Performing Arts Center
Opening ceremonies for the month-long celebration will feature the Liz Lerman Dance Exchange performing “The Farthest Earth From Thee: De-Exceptionalizing Disabilities in Performance.” Liz Lerman, Peter DiMuro and members of the cast will offer lively, animated excerpts from their original production The Farthest Earth From Thee, which features company and guest dancers—with and without disabilities—who transform Shakespeare’s “Sonnet 44” into explosive, rolling and careening movement that articulates the sonnet's structures and imagery. This Dance Exchange project will also provide the audience with opportunities to engage the artists directly in discussion.
Immediately prior to the dance performance, University of Maryland President Dan Mote will present the annual President’s Commission on Disability Issues Award to recognize campus citizens who have made a significant contribution towards improving the quality of life and campus culture for people with disabilities. Members of the campus community are invited to nominate students, faculty, or staff, and nformation on the nominations process is available at http://www.president.umd.edu/PCDI/awards.html. Names of the award winners will be announced in mid September.
The 2007 PCDI Award will be presented by President Mote immediately prior to the performance. Please join us afterwards for a reception in the lobby.
October 10, 12:00 – 1:45 p.m.
Maryland Room, 0100 Marie Mount
Hall
Notable disability studies scholars David Mitchell and Sharon Snyder of the University of Illinois at Chicago will present the second lecture in the 2007-08 Provost’s Conversations on Diversity, Democracy and Higher Education series. Snyder and Mitchell will explore how culturally-rooted disability activism can accomplish attitudinal, social, and material change. They will argue that grassroots collectives of disabled people offer ways to create more humane democracies, because active efforts to include disabled people also give other marginalized, multi-cultural, and cross-disability constituencies access to the structures of citizenship, and literally transform public space.
A light lunch will be provided.
October 24, 4:30 p.m. (CANCELLED!)
The discussion will focus on the constitutional basis for regulations and programs that address the needs of people with disabilities. The tensions between the constitutional rights of individuals and organizational cultures and norms—especially in higher education—will be explored.
October 31, 2:00 – 3: 00 p.m.
Maryland Room, 0100 Marie Mount
Hall
Effective teaching and learning means that all students have equal opportunity to participate and to learn. A panel of campus experts, faculty, and students will review strategies for course design that accommodate multiple ways of learning and foster a more inclusive environment for students with disabilities.
October 1-31
Please see the Libraries' Disability Awareness Month website for more information about the exhibits and for reading lists on disability memoir, disability history, and disability studies.
The University of Maryland’s 2007 Disability Awareness Month activities are co-sponsored by the President’s Commission on Disability Issues in cooperation with the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center, the Office of the Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost, the School of Public Health, the Center for Teaching Excellence, and the University Libraries. All events are free and open to the public. Visit http://www.cvs.umd.edu/visit/parking.html for detailed parking information.