Judith Heumann knows what it’s like to be excluded and invisible. But she has made enough noise throughout her life that people listen to her now.
At the age of 18 months, she contracted polio, after which she required a wheelchair to get around.
She wasn’t permitted to attend public school in the early 1950s because her wheelchair was considered a fire hazard. Her parents fought for her right to attend school.
Meanwhile, she received about 2½ hours of home instruction per week. Fortunately for her, she grew up in a family that valued reading, and her father was interested in math, so while her parents didn’t teach her formally, she learned a lot from them.
“When I was still in home instruction, my reading level was really high,” she said.
But home schooling wasn’t what her parents wanted for her.
“I don’t even know if formal home schooling existed at that point,” she explained. “I wasn’t at home because they wanted to home school me.”
She was allowed to attend school halfway through the fourth grade, but she was in a segregated special education class that didn’t follow the curriculum of the regular classes.
She finally got access to some mainstream classes when she went to high school, though not full time.
“The first year, three of my classes were not integrated,” she said. “I took math and foreign language in the regular classroom and the other (classes) in special education, but it was the same curriculum.”
She might not have been able to keep up in high school without her parents.
“When I went to high school it was a rude awakening, particularly when I was in regular classes,” Heumann said. She had been accustomed to much smaller special education classes and never took regular exams until high school.
However, she found a way to learn and to thrive, graduated from Long Island University and earned her master’s degree at University of California, Berkeley. She has become one of the world’s foremost advocates for the rights of people with disabilities.
Her book, “Being Heumann: An Unrepentant Memoir of a Disability Rights Advocate,” written with Kristen Joiner, tells of her lifetime of activism.
Heumann will take part in two events at the Tucson Festival of Books.
“Women of Conscience,” with Heumann, Norma Cantú, author of “Cabañuelas: A Novel,” and Debra Gwartney, author of “I Am a Stranger Here Myself,” is at 1 p.m. March 14, at the UA Library Special Collections. The three panelists have called upon their own life experiences in books seeking change in our government, in our culture and in each of us.
“On Being Heumann” is at 1 p.m. March 15, in the Student Union Kiva room. Heumann will talk about her advocacy and experiences.
Heumann was a founding member of the Berkeley Center for Independent Living and co-founded the World Institute on Disability with Ed Roberts and Joan Leon in 1982. She served in the Clinton Administration as assistant secretary for the Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services, and then was the World Bank’s first advisor on disability and development.
President Barack Obama appointed Heumann as the first Special Advisor for International Disability Rights at the State Department, where she served until 2017. She has served in many other capacities helping to further understanding and inclusion for people with disabilities.
She has played a role in the implementation of legislation at the national level for programs in special education, research, vocational rehabilitation and independent living.
With the Ford Foundation she worked to help advance the inclusion of disabled people in the media and is currently serving on several nonprofit boards and is an ambassador for Leonard Cheshire, which works to break down barriers that deny rights for people with disabilities around the world.
Heumann is featured in the documentary “Crip Camp,” which won first place for the Audience Award for U.S. Documentary at the Sundance Film Festival. The film will be on Netflix in March.
“In some ways I feel very lucky, because my life would be totally different if I hadn’t had polio,” Heumann said.
