Starr Guckert:  

I probably had the same hopes and dreams after high school that everyone else had; college, a job that I felt mattered and contributed positively to my community, a husband that I loved and who loved me just for myself, and children. Unfortunately, as they say, life happens while you're making other plans. I did well in college, but discovered half-way through that I was not going to be allowed to graduate with the degree I wanted and the reason was simply the fact that I couldn't see as well as my classmates. That caused an abrupt change in plans as I left one school to go to another where my visual impairment disn't seem to matter as much. With one exception, the teachers were supportive without being cloying, and, for the first time in my life I actually had a social life, caught up in a group of students who were musicians, singers and actors. I discovered that the most important things that I learned during those last 2 years didn't happen in the classroom or in the library, but in the friendships I made, one of which (one of my professors) I cherish to this day. I also developed my first MAJOR crush, on someone who was in lust with my best friend, and I learned that jealousy is a complete waste of time and energy. When I graduated from college, there were 10,000 more teachers in NYS than there were jobs and every job I applied for had that dreaded question "do you have a physical, mental or emotional disability". If I said "no" it was a lie and they didn't have to hire me. If I said "yes", I never heard from them again. My BRILLIANT counselor from the Commission for the Blind called me one day and suggested that I apply for a job as an itinerant teacher in a 4 county area in southwest NY. When I asked him how I was supposed to get from place to place, he blythely replied "buy a car and hire a driver." HUH? He obviously didn't know how little a teacher got paid. After about 5 years of taking care of other peoples' kids, I decided to do something practical, so I took a medical secretarial course at the local community college. Latin actually came in handy (Thank you Mr. McGuinn), and my life took an unexpected turn when I was asked to help save the Coordinator of Disabled Student Services. While I didn't need one, because I had already survived a BS degree on my own, I understood the importance. I maintain that the community college was where I took Rabble Rousing 101. In addition to saving the position and bullying the college president into complying the 5 year old non-discrimination laws for people with disabilities. In addition, I managed to prevent one teacher from getting tenure. Understand, this was not out of vindictiveness, but while I was taking her classes, I saw and heard the abuse that she doled out to other students, and wasn't afraid of her and "the red pen". One of the classes I took from her was office machines and, since I'd gone as far as analytic geometry and calculus in high school, other younger students from the city school district didn't understand how to work out problems. When they went to her for help, her response was invariably "read the book". So they turned to those of us in class who did know what to do and how to do it, until the teacher declared that they could no longer ask anyone for help. I also took medical shorthand from her (she taught legal shorthand as well) and she couldn't pronounce the Latin or Greek terms, then blamed us when we didn't score high on her tests. She referred to two other, older students in the class as "handicapped" because they were from India and France. They had beautiful accents, but she claimed that it was a hindrance to properly pronouncing medical terminology. I was seeing her from the point of view of student to teacher, but also from teacher to teacher. I wrote out an eight page complaint and, coupled with what the other teachers overheard from the younger students, the decision was made not to extend an offer of tenure. SHE LANDED ON ME WITH BOTH FEET, and it was the first time that I ever stood there, took what she had to say, and didn't shrivel and didn't need to get defensive. That was in October and I stayed in her shorthand class and failed every test until the last possible date that I could drop the course. I never made it past 70 words per minute because I didn't have the eye-hand coordination and found it difficult, as an English major, to process words phonetically. All of that led me into the disability rights movement. I started out volunteering with Easter Seals, doing accessibility studies in public places (like the community college that I had attended), county buildings, hospitals, other colleges, the state fairgrounds, the results of which were published in an accessibility guide for people with disabilities. The next step was working with Dr. Carol Berrigan on her doctoral dissertation. She had developed a program to present to teachers on integrating children with disabilities into their classrooms according to the Education for All Handicapped Children Act of 1975 (affectionately known as PL 94-142). From there, it was just a step to volunteer with Easter Seals to develop a program to take into schools on having classmates with disabilities. I did the introduction unit, and the unit on children with visual impairments. I've spoken in classrooms and to auditoriums filled with 900 students. I got involved with Disabled in Action of Greater Syracuse, a grassroots disability rights group, and spent 5 years advocating for the local transit system to put lifts on their buses, and they fought us every step of the way, even though the law said they had to. We even did the research that showed which lift would work with which buses in our climate. Of course, they didn't listen, and the result was 25 buses whose lifts broke down on a regular basis because they were exposed to the snow. salt and sand. Now, 30 years later, all of the buses have lifts that actually work, and I'm on the advisory council to the transit system. In 1979, I was asked to serve on the Board of Directors of our area's first independent living center. The independent living movement, which had started in Berkley in 1964, was based on the premise that people with disabilities could help other people with disabilities develop the skills they needed to lead independent, meaningful lives. I was at a Board meeting in May of 1980 when the Director, who kenw I hd taken secretarial classes, offered me the job of secretary, which had suddenly become vacant. I worked as a secretary for 8 months and was then promoted to Community Advocate. As a community advocate, it was my role to get involved in systems advocacy in the community. I spent a lot of time serving on Boards and committees and working to change how people with disabilities were treated. I was fired in October, 1982 and, after 2 agonizing months of soul searching (how do you sue an agency that advocates for the rights of people with disabilities for discrimination based on disability and discrimination based on sex. My boss would say things like "we don't want any more blind ones in the office", "blind people are boring because they have no facial expressions". You get the idea. The suit was filed in federal court and for $1 million. I knew I wasn't going to get that, but it was the only way we could get them to take us seriously. They settled out of court and I got everything I asked for (except the $1 million). It was tough looking for a job, having been fired, and even harder to continue to attend Board and committee meetings when everyone in the disability rights community knew that I had been fired and that I had been "trashed". After a year and 3 months of unemployment, and nearly having to give up my apartment, I went to one Board meeting and was invited to apply for the position of Administrative Assistant. The Director knew what had happened and knew that I was suing my former employer. I was actually working for 2 agencies. Each had a separate Board of Directors and program staff, but a shared administrative staff. Kind of crazy-making. At first, my role was strictly administrative, taking minutes for Board meetings and Board committees (for 2 agencies) and administering a $53,000 program for children under 14 and adults over 55 who had visual impairments. Gradually, I began to move into program planning and implementation. I started our Lov Vision Center, scheduling appointments, ordering stock, doing billing, etc. Two years after I started that program, I made the mistake of turning my back by going on vacation over the Christmas holidays, and came back to discover that I was Project Coordinator for the Telephone Switchboard Service at the VA Medical Center. Ours was the 5th program in the nation, and up and running in half the time that it had taken the others. Since VA staff were absolutely convince...Expand for more