Symposium Speaker Information

Richard Lavoie, M.A., M.Ed.

Rick Lavoie has served as an administrator of residential programs for children with special needs since 1972. He holds three degrees in Special Education and has served as an adjunct professor or visiting lecturer at numerous universities including Syracuse, Harvard, Gallaudet, Manhattanville College, University of Alabama and Georgetown. His numerous national television appearances include CBS Morning Show, Good Morning America, ABC Evening News and Disney Channel Presents.

Rick serves as a consultant on learning disabilities to several agencies and organizations including Public Broadcasting Service, New York Times, National Center for Learning Disabilities, Girl Scouts of America, Child Magazine and WETA. He is a member of the Professional Advisor Board of the Learning Disabilities Association.

Rick has delivered his message to over 500,000 parents and professionals throughout North America. He has the distinction of having delivered Keynote Addresses for all three of the major special needs advocacy organizations in the United States (Learning Disabilities Association, Council for Exceptional Children, Children with Attention Deficit Disorder).

Rick has held administrative positions at residential programs for thirty years. These experiences at residential school have provided Rick with a "living laboratory" in which he developed and refined his methods and philosophies related to the education of adolescents with special needs.

Rick is probably best known for his videos "How Difficult Can This Be?: The “F.A.T. City Workshop" and "Last One Picked, First One Picked On: The Social Implications of Learning Disabilities". These award-winning films have brought Rick's sensitive and compelling message to countless thousands throughout the world. After viewing the videos, former First Lady Barbara Bush stated, "You really wowed us! I only wish that every parent and teacher in the United States today could also see your program." His new video on behavior management is entitled "When the Chips are Down ..." is now available through LD OnLine.

Rick lives on Cape Cod with his wife.

Judith Heumann

Judith Heumann is an internationally recognized leader in the disability community and a lifelong civil rights advocate. She currently is the Director for the Department on Disability Services for the District of Columbia. She is responsible for the Mental Retardation and Developmental Disability Administration and the Rehabilitation Services Administration.

From June 2002- 2006, Judith E. Heumann served as the World Bank's first Adviser on Disability and Development. In this position, Heumann led the World Bank's disability initiative to expand the Bank’s knowledge and understanding of the importance of including disability when working with governments and civil society during Bank discussions with client countries, its country-based analytical work, and support for improving policies, programs, and projects that allow people with disabilities around the world to live and work in the economic and social mainstream of their communities. She is currently the Lead Consultant to the Global Partnership for Disability and Development.

From 1993 to 2001, Heumann served in the Clinton Administration as the Assistant Secretary for the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services in the Department of Education. Heumann was responsible for the implementation of legislation at the national level for programs in special education, disability research, vocational rehabilitation and independent living, serving more than 8 million youth and adults with disabilities.

For over 30 years, Heumann has been involved on the international front working with organizations and governments around the world to advance the human rights of disabled people. She represented Education Secretary, Richard Riley, at the 1995 International Congress on Disability in Mexico City. She was a US delegate to the Fourth United Nations World Conference on Women in Beijing, China. And she has been active with Disabled People International, Rehabilitation International and numerous Independent Living Centers throughout the world. She co-founded the Center for Independent Living in Berkeley California and the World Institute on Disability in Oakland California.

Heumann has served on numerous local, national and international boards of directors and currently serves on a number of Boards of directors including the U.S. International Council on Disability, the American Association of People with Disabilities, Post Polio Health International and the Starkloff Institute.

She graduated from Long Island University in 1969 and received her Masters in Public Health from the University of California at Berkeley in 1975. She has received numerous awards including being the first recipient of the Henry B. Betts Award in recognition of efforts to significantly improve the quality of life for people with disabilities. She has received an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters from Long Island University in Brooklyn, an Honorary Doctorate of Public Administration from the University of Illinois, Champaign, and an Honorary Doctorate of Public Service from the University of Toledo.

ARTHUR LEONARD CAPLAN

Currently, Arthur Caplan is the Emmanuel and Robert Hart Professor of Bioethics, Chair of the Department of Medical Ethics and the Director of the Center for Bioethics at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. Prior to coming to Penn in 1994, Caplan taught at the University of Minnesota, the University of Pittsburgh, and Columbia University. He was the Associate Director of the Hastings Center from 1984-1987.

Born in Boston, Caplan did his undergraduate work at Brandeis University, and did his graduate work at Columbia University where he received a Ph.D in the history and philosophy of science in 1979. He is the author or editor of 29 books and over 500 papers in refereed journals of medicine, science, philosophy, bioethics and health policy. His most recent book is Smart Mice Not So Smart People (Rowman Littlefield, 2006).

Arthur Caplan has served on a number of national and international committees. He chairs the following committees: National Cancer Institute Biobanking Ethics Working Group, Advisory Committee to the United Nations on Human Cloning, Advisory Committee to the Department of Health and Human Services on Blood Safety and Availability; and is a member of the following committees: Presidential Advisory Committee on Gulf War Illnesses, Special Advisory Committee to the International Olympic Committee on Genetics and Gene Therapy, Ethics Committee of the American Society of Gene Therapy, and Special Advisory Panel to the National Institutes of Mental Health on Human Experimentation on Vulnerable Subjects. He has consulted with many corporations, not for profit organizations and consumer organizations. He is a member of the board of directors of The Keystone Center, Tengion, the National Center for Policy Research on Women and Families, Octagon, Iron Disorders Foundation and the National Disease Research Interchange. He chairs the advisory committee on bioethics at Glaxo. He is on the board of visitors of the Columbia University School of Nursing. He writes a regular column on bioethics for MSNBC.com. He is a frequent guest and commentator on various media outlets.

Caplan is the recipient of many awards and honors including the McGovern Medal of the American Medical Writers Association and the Franklin Award from the City of Philadelphia. He was a person of the Year-2001 from USA Today, one of the fifty most influential people in American health care by Modern Health Care magazine, one of the ten most influential people in America in biotechnology by the National Journal and one of the ten most influential people in the ethics of biotechnology by the editors of Nature Biotechnology. He holds seven honorary degrees from colleges and medical schools. He is a fellow of the Hastings Center, the NY Academy of Medicine, the College of Physicians of Philadelphia and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.