Getting to Community

Individual rights and freedoms that didn’t exist for people with developmental disabilities are now being recognized, for the first time in history. The expectations of people coming into services have changed, and will continue to change as more people claim their rightful place in community. The next chapter of the community living movement is being written right now, by the people who are living it. Self advocates are claiming this movement as their own, emerging as leaders in their own right as never before. The skills needed to support their self-determination – to support people to author their own lives, to paraphrase John O’Brien – are different skills than the ones we’ve relied on in the past. This book is for the front line supporters who will walk with this generation into the future and work with them to navigate a path forward.