"My disability was never my barrier," says, Haben Girma.
She went to Lewis and Clark College and successfully pushed for her legal rights to accommodation in the school cafeteria. She graduated magna cum laude in 2010.
In 2013, she became Harvard Law School’s first deaf-blind graduate. Aside from being a lawyer, Girma is also an a disability rights advocate who has met and have been honored by world leaders like Canada's Justin Trudeau and Germany's Angela Merkel.
Former US President Barack Obama named Girma a White House Champion of Change in 2013. Two years later, she was appointed to the National Board of Trustee for the Helen Keller Services for the Blind.
She is also an author who wrote about the challenges of a deaf blind woman "who conquered Harvard Law."
She says, “I want a future where disabled people have equal opportunities to services, health, education — everything should be fully accessible.”
Girma is a strong advocate of ableism, which I have learned from Wikipedia as the discrimination and social prejudice against people with disabilities or who are perceived to have disabilities.
It is described by www.stopableism.org as "The practices and dominant attitudes in society that devalue and limit the potential of persons with disabilities. A set of practices and beliefs that assign inferior value (worth) to people who have developmental, emotional, physical or psychiatric disabilities."
It further describes "an ableist society is said to be one that treats non-disabled individuals as the standard of ‘normal living’, which results in public and private places and services, education, and social work that are built to serve 'standard' people, thereby inherently excluding those with various disabilities."
Girma's life continues to be an inspiration to many women, specially, those who face tough challenges.
She says, “Stop framing disability as a barrier. Disabled people are successful because communities choose to remove the barriers. I was the first deaf-blind student to graduate from Harvard Law School, not because I overcame disability. I'm still disabled and still deaf-blind. It was Harvard that overcame some of their ableism.”
PWD are present in our communities. While there is growing awareness on their special needs but a lot more work needs to be done by government to legislate more laws that protect their rights and provide benefits. And for everyday people to remove their "barriers" and embrace their presence in our communities.
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