“Let’s Get to Work:” A Podcast from the Disability Employment Policy Rehabilitation Research and Training Center (DEP RRTC) – Burton Blatt Institute at Syracuse University.
Lex Frieden, in the inaugural episode of the DEP RRTC’s Let’s Get to Work podcast, discusses his life journey as a pioneering disability rights advocate and national thought leader.
On Saturday night, November 20, 1967, Lex was injured in a car accident and doctors said he’d never walk again. Although Lex recalls, “That did not really have an impact on me at the time,” he soon discovered, “there were barriers literally everywhere . . .. There were steps everywhere, and no accommodations whatsoever.”
That realization launched a lifetime of national leadership and disability advocacy.
Peter Blanck, University Professor and Chairman of the Burton Blatt Institute at Syracuse University, and Principal Investigator of the DEP RRTC, hosts Lex, who discusses his experiences as a key architect of the independent living movement and the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990.
Lex highlights the importance of work for people with disabilities and the evolution of disability employment policy: “if we’re not working, then we’re not contributing to the public good. We’re not paying taxes, we are not engaging in the economy to the extent that we can … by working, we are contributing to the product in the workforce, and we’re generating income that we can circulate back through the economy that will benefit the employers.”
Lex notes that “the younger generation is finding that there are still barriers to employment.” But he remains optimistic, confident that young and future advocates will “pick up the torch and move on, as I’m seeing happen.”
Listen to Lex on the inaugural Let’s Get to Work podcast
View a transcript of the episode
The DEP RRTC is a research, education, and training center dedicated to enhancing employment opportunities and outcomes for people with disabilities, developed under a grant from the National Institute on Disability, Independent Living, and Rehabilitation Research (NIDILRR grant number 90RTEM0016). The focus of our work is an expansive, five-year agenda of coordinated research projects designed to explore and identify the policies, factors, and conditions that empower people with disabilities to access and succeed in the workforce. For more information, visit their website: www.bbi-dep-rrtc.org.