From September 23-25, 2024 West Region Self Advocate Steven Tobey and Self Advocacy Peer Coordinator, Amber Pettell traveled to Marlborough, MA to participate in the 2024 Paul W. Spooner Generational Leadership Summit. 

The summit, hosted by the Massachusetts Developmental Disabilities Council (MDDC), Disability Policy Consortium (DPC), and Boston Center for Independent Living (BCIL), tackles the future of disability advocacy.

The summit included the new generation of disability advocacy leaders, and emerging leaders in advocacy in social justice for services, programs, and the human and civil rights of people with disabilities in Massachusetts. New and emerging disabled leaders came together with some existing leaders to discuss where disability advocacy needs to go in the coming decade, and what we can learn from the past that got us to where we are today.

Steven and Amber recently sat down to discuss the experience.

Amber: In your own words, what is the Paul W. Spooner Generational Leadership Summit?

Steven: The Paul W. Spooner Generational Leadership Summit is to help people gain leadership skills and learn about disability history and more about activism. We also did work groups where everyone got to choose between three different things, housing, public transit and the rights of people with disabilities. So the goal was to teach us to be leaders that build change campaigns. It’s about building ideas that work to change things in positive ways.

Amber: What made you want to apply?

Steven: I was interested in learning new skills on how to become a better leader for my self advocacy group and for the West Region. I hope to use some of those skills that I learned to help lead some of the west region self advocates and help people reach their goals

A: What’s one thing that you want to change in the world,  or is there anything you want to build to make something better? 

S: The one thing I would hope that I can change or make better is creating more and better housing for people who have disabilities. 

A: Do you want to talk a little bit about the housing related project that you worked on at the summit?

S: So the project might help us get more housing resources out to people with disabilities. So our goal is to try to create a forum event where people with disabilities can go to learn and get help. We want to show people the resources that already exist that they can use.

A: What was your favorite part of the summit?

S: My favorite part was probably learning about the ADA law, which I found out that was actually signed six days after I was born. On July 26th of 1990. My birthday is July 20th, 1990. I also liked the different workshops they had for us to help build change campaigns.

A: Did you have a favorite workshop?

S: My favorite one probably was the “What is a Campaign?” workshop.

A: Was there any part of the summit that was difficult or stressful, or that you were unsure about? 

S:The most difficult part was probably when we had to split up into our groups and we all had to come up with an idea for an activism campaign. Everyone worked on one of three topics; transportation, housing, or rights and advocacy. Each group was big and sometimes it was pretty hard to agree. with that many people, and so  many ideas floating around it can feel overwhelming. It was hard to narrow it down. But in the end all the groups presented one idea that we will work on over the next year.

A: Would the PWSGL Summit be something you would encourage other folks to do?

S: Oh yes! I have already encouraged some of the other guys in my advocacy group to do it, and I would encourage any other self advocates out there in the West Region to do it.

A: And what would you want them to know about it as they think about applying for next year?

S: If you are interested in learning, leadership and activism you should do it. But be ready to work hard. Those couple of days are long days, you won’t get done till at least 9 o’clock at night. It’s fun but it is real work too.

A: Is there anything else about your experience with the PWSGL Summit that you would want folks to know?

S: I really enjoyed meeting different people from around the state.

A: Yeah, that’s actually my favorite part, it’s a really cool community.

A: Are you looking forward to going back next year? 

S: Yes.

A: Yeah, me too.

If you are interested in learning more about the PWSGL Summit check out: www.paulspoonergenerationalleadership.org

If you are interested in becoming a part of Massachusetts West Self Advocacy, please contact Amber Pettell, apettell@wmtcinfo.org or Ris Houde,  rhoude@wmtcinfo.org