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The Florida Grantor, Fall 2000

Footnotes

Advocates Manual Available

"Benefits Management for People with Disabilities", an Advocate's Manual, Year 2000 edition, is a manual designed as a reference book for attorneys, advocates, rehabilitation professionals, persons with disabilities, human resource persons and others concerned with how work affects benefits.

You can view portions of the manual at http://www.nls.org/2000edtn.htm.

The complete manual can also be ordered on the website or by calling The Greater Upstate Law Project at 715-454-6500.

National Service Opportunities for People with Disabilities

The Florida Commission on Community Service (FCCS), which administers AmeriCorps programs throughout Florida, is working to insure that persons with disabilities are part of community service initiatives like AmeriCorps. For one year of full-time service (1700 hours), you can make a difference in your community and, in return, receive a living allowance and an educational scholarship.

The following AmeriCorps programs are recruiting new members for projects that started in September 2000. For additional information, please contact FCCS at 850-921-5172 voice/tty.

AmeriCorps Florida Reads!

AmeriCorps Florida Reads! provides literacy tutoring to over 3,000 students grades K-3 and parent or caregiver education workshops. The family education workshops encourage parents and caregivers to read at least one hour per week to their children. The services are provided at 13 different locations throughout Florida. For more information, contact Mary Rosen by phone at 850-422-3558/850-488-2819 or by email at cisleon@nettally.com

AmeriCorps OWCC

AmeriCorps OWCC provides tutoring to raise reading levels of elementary school children identified as reading below grade level. This is done through intensive, consistent, and systematic one-on-one or small group reading assistance by AmeriCorps OWCC members. For more information, contact Susie Flood by phone at 850-729-6037 or by email at floods@owcc.net

AmeriCorps Tallahassee

AmeriCorps Tallahassee provides reading skills, tutoring and after-school programs for at-risk students at local elementary schools. The program's goal is to improve the reading skills of these students. For more information, call Kathy Hood by phone at 850-487-4321 or by email at Hoodk@mail.leon.k12.fl.us.

Center for Women Policy Studies Publishes Disability Report

The Center for Women Policy Studies, a national multi-ethnic feminist policy research and advocacy organization, has published two important reports on disabled women's issues. The center prepared "Women and Girls with Disabilities: Defining the Issues-An Overview," by Barbara Waxman Fiduccia and Leslie R. Wolfe, for the first-ever conference for grantmakers on women and girls with disabilities, convened by Women and Philanthropy, DFN, the Center, and other groups in June 1999. The paper briefly addresses a wide range of issues-including physician-assisted suicide, access to health care, reproductive rights and health, family life, education and employment, violence against disabled women and girls, and disabled women's leadership. The report is available from the Center for $8.00 per copy.

In the first of a series of Research and Data in Brief reports on disabled women's issues, the Center published Violence Against Disabled Women, also by Barbara Waxman Fiduccia and Leslie R. Wolfe. This paper summarizes research findings and data on the prevalence of violence against disabled women and girls and its impact. Topics include domestic abuse and battering, sexual abuse of girls, rape and sexual assault, and forms of violence against disabled women and girls that are masked as socially accepted treatment within families and institutions. The report is available from the Center for $4.00 per copy.

In November of 2000 the Center will publish two new reports. The first is tentatively entitled "Creating Our Future-Disabled Girls and Teen Women" and is authored by Harilyn Rousso, a winner of the Center's 2000 Jessie Bernard Wise Women Award. The second addresses disability feminism and is tentatively titled "Disability Rights and Women's Rights-Shared Values and Visions"; its author is Rosemarie Garland Thomson-a leader in the field of disability and feminist studies.

For information about the Center's work on these and other issues, contact Center president Leslie R. Wolfe at 202-872-1770 or lwolfe@centerwomenpolicy.org.