Dr. Kirk Adams

💙 ISDI GoFundMe Campaign — Become a Founding Supporter and Help Build the Community Coalition for Sustainable Diversity & Inclusion to Fight for Fairness, Inclusion, Equal Opportunity and Human Dignity For All — Nationwide
https://gofund.me/11c9c1cf3

I'm Dr. Kirk Adams — blind since age five, former president & CEO of the American Foundation for the Blind, and now Executive Director of the Institute for Sustainable Diversity and Inclusion (ISDI). I'm asking for your help. 🙏

Across the country, we are living through an orchestrated assault on diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility, and belonging. Programs are being dismantled. Leaders are being pushed out. People with disabilities — and so many others — are losing hard-won rights, services, and opportunity. The people doing this work are increasingly isolated and under pressure.

We refuse to accept that retreat as permanent. ✊

That's why ISDI is building the Community Coalition for Sustainable Diversity & Inclusion — a national online home where DEIAB practitioners, people with disabilities, allies, and advocates can connect, learn, share resources, and organize together. Because we accomplish far more together than any of us can alone.

This is for everyone in the fight — practitioners and leaders, the communities most affected by the rollback (including BIPOC, LGBTQ+, disabled, veteran, and student voices), and the allies who refuse to look away. Inside, members will find connection, practical tools and resources, peer support, workshops, and a place to organize together instead of navigating this climate alone.

Our goal: raise $20,000 to launch the Coalition on the Circle platform — the website, mobile app, onboarding, programming, and first-year costs. Every dollar goes directly into building this infrastructure.

ISDI is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit, so your gift is fully tax-deductible. For nearly three decades, our Northwest Diversity Learning Series has educated thousands of leaders on building inclusive workplaces. We know how to do this work — and we're ready to scale it.

Here's what your gift builds:

💲 $25 — expands outreach to bring more people in
💲 $50 — fuels community programming and engagement
💲 $100 — funds platform tools and implementation
💲 $250 — powers workshops, peer learning, and strategy-sharing
💲 $500+ — builds a sustainable national coalition

Inclusion isn't just the right thing to do — it's a strategic advantage, for every workplace and every community. But right now, it needs defenders.

Please donate today, become a Founding Supporter, and share this with anyone who believes a more just, accessible, and inclusive future is worth building. Early gifts build the momentum that carries us forward. 💙

👉 Donate now: https://gofund.me/11c9c1cf3

🔬 Paid Research Opportunity: Neurotrophic Keratitis | By Dr. Kirk Adams | Courtesy of the PWD Media Co-op
https://rarepatientvoice.com/rp/DrKirk

Living with Neurotrophic Keratitis, or know someone who is? Rare Patient Voice wants to hear from you — and they'll pay you for your time.

👤 Who: Patients diagnosed with Neurotrophic Keratitis
📝 What: 15-minute online survey
💵 Compensation: $30

Please share with anyone who may qualify. 💜

🎙️ Remarkable World Commentary Episode #95: Ask Advocate Donna | By Donna J. Jodhan, LLB, ACSP, MBA | Courtesy of the PWD Media Co-Op
https://donnajodhan.com/rwc-06-02-2026/

In this instructive episode of Remarkable World Commentary, Donna J. Jodhan presents her recurring "Ask Advocate Donna" segment, opening with two reflective word-game pairings she invites listeners to ponder: defensive versus offensive, and sympathy versus empathy. She resists treating either as an either-or choice, arguing that a seasoned advocate must learn when each posture or response is appropriate rather than committing to one. She frames the whole episode with her guiding ethos, borrowed in spirit from a "let's make it better than possible" sentiment, that advocacy means refusing to settle for merely acceptable outcomes.

The heart of the episode is three listener-submitted scenarios, each dissected through the same four-part lens of what advocacy is, who gets involved, why it is necessary, and how to begin. A woman using a wheelchair, Lucy, is turned away from a concert hall officials claim cannot accommodate her; a boy, Hamid, is denied entry to his condo pool because a lifeguard fears being unable to communicate with him in English; and a blind woman is told a call-center job was "just filled," then bluntly informed she could not be hired because of her vision impairment, which Donna labels outright discrimination. For each, she models how the affected person and their allies can challenge the gatekeepers, question officials, and enlist support from advocacy organizations. She closes by inviting listener feedback at [email protected].

📋 Access App Club Survey | By Dr. Kirk Adams | Courtesy of the PWD Media Co-op
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLSe4B_0-dfuGeQ1tGE0ZzC1xV-ideT9TFQm_fbazQXYexArd4Q/viewform

Accessible apps are too often built without input from the blind and low-vision community. Dr. Edward Metz is developing Access App Club to give BVI students a direct role in shaping the apps and tools they use — and he wants your feedback first.

👉 Take the short 4-question survey (link above)
✉️ Questions: [email protected]

Please share widely. 💜

A Tale of Indifference: Introducing Braillewright — The All-New, Always-Free WordPress Theme from Top Tech Tidbits, Developed Against WCAG 2.2 AA Standards
https://toptechtidbits.com/introducing-the-braillewright-wordpress-theme/

Here, Aaron Di Blasi, Publisher for the Top Tech Tidbits weekly newsletter, introduces the Braillewright WordPress Theme, the all-new, always-free WordPress theme from Top Tech Tidbits, developed against WCAG 2.2 AA standards. Part cautionary tale and part solution, the piece surfaces a truth most site owners never hear: the theme you choose can quietly determine a large share of your website's underlying accessibility, even though that fact is all but invisible in the marketing, and even WordPress's own "Accessibility Ready" label, by the admission of its own Theme Handbook, does not mean a theme meets WCAG AA. Genuine accessibility, Di Blasi argues, is never a one-time checkbox; it demands ongoing testing, by both automated tools and human assistive-technology users, for the entire life of a theme.

Braillewright is his answer. After buying an "accessibility-ready" theme and its paid "Pro" add-on for a client, only to run into basic accessibility defects the theme's developer was in no hurry to fix, Di Blasi realized the code was open-source under the GPL, which let him fork it, merge the free and paid versions into a single no-cost theme, remediate it, and commit to maintaining it for the community. The result, built with AI assistance and already running live on both Top Tech Tidbits and Access Information News, is continuously remediated and monitored with both automated and human screen-reader testing plus free automatic updates, and it's free for anyone to download and install on any WordPress host, no strings attached.

AI-Weekly for Tuesday, June 30, 2026 - Issue 223 | By Aaron Di Blasi, Publisher | Courtesy of the PWD Media Co-Op
https://ai-weekly.ai/newsletter-06-30-2026/

✨ The Week's News in Artificial Intelligence
A Mind Vault Solutions, Ltd. Publication


Email Subscribers: 50,749 🔢️
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AI-Weekly is the world's #1 online resource for current news and trends in artificial intelligence that reaches over 50,000 AI professionals, educators and enthusiasts, all over the world, each week.

Henry Viscardi School High School Graduation: June 25, 2026 | By Dr. Kirk Adams | Courtesy of the PWD Media Co-op
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PkX_pL9nq3o

On June 25, 2026, the Henry Viscardi School held its 59th commencement ceremony, opening with a processional that brought in the board of trustees and administration (led by President and CEO Dr. Christopher Rosa), the faculty and staff (led by faculty marshal Carol Dolan), and the Class of 2026 graduates (led by student marshal Frank Bganti). After two students, Angel and Ethan, led the Pledge of Allegiance, the ceremony recognized distinguished guests on stage, including Dr. Chris Rosa of the Viscardi Center; commencement speaker and HVS alumnus Chris Alvarez; board chairperson Beth Daly; principal Jessica Kajiano; and assistant principal Patricia Barrett, and honored three retiring staff members, Carol Dolan, Patty Fisher, and Katherine Alfonte, who together represent more than 120 years of service to the school.

The opening address celebrated the Class of 2026 not for a single achievement but for how the students treated one another, supporting, celebrating, and creating a sense of belonging, recalling their senior trip to Philadelphia and late nights with friends and Insomnia Cookies. The speaker tied this to founder Dr. Henry Viscardi's belief that a disability should never define a person and that everyone deserves the chance to pursue their goals, urging graduates to embrace independence, advocate for themselves, dream big, and remember they remain part of the HVS community. The ceremony then moved into its academic tradition with the salutatory address, delivered by Angel Vega Ortiz, who reflected on growing from being nervous to even board the bus into someone who found Viscardi to be a place of deep memories and meaningful lessons.

Some People Climb Mountains; Some People Are Mountains: Remembering Jim Whittaker | By Dr. Kirk Adams | Courtesy of the PWD Media Co-op
https://drkirkadams.com/remembering-jim-whittaker/

Here, Dr. Kirk Adams remembers Jim Whittaker, the first American to summit Mount Everest, who died on April 7, 2026, at the age of 97. Forty-five years after the two men first met, Adams looks past the famous summits of Whittaker's career, Everest, K2, the 1990 Everest International Peace Climb, and his decades building REI, to the climb he believes revealed Whittaker best: Project Pelion, the 1981 expedition that paired twelve climbers with disabilities with twelve of the country's finest mountaineers on the slopes of Mount Rainier. As a nineteen-year-old who had been blind since the age of five, Adams trained alongside Whittaker and his wife, Dianne Roberts, near Aspen, climbed the mountain only days after its deadliest accident, and became the first blind person to stand on Rainier's summit, on Whittaker's own rope team.

The piece is both a tribute and a thesis. Adams recalls a mentor who did not carry him up the mountain but believed he belonged on it, and who later called guiding that team his own Mount Everest. From that memory Adams draws the conviction that has shaped his work ever since: that greatness lies in who you bring with you, and that inclusion is not charity but a strategic advantage, in the workplace as surely as on a glacier.

We Can't Wait for Someone Else to Build the Future: Become a Founding Supporter of the Community Coalition for Sustainable Diversity & Inclusion Today | By Dr. Kirk Adams | Courtesy of the PWD Media Co-op
https://drkirkadams.com/become-a-founding-supporter-of-the-ccsdi/

Here, Dr. Kirk Adams, Executive Director for ISDI, turns a moment of fear into a call to arms. Writing as diversity, equity, inclusion, accessibility, and belonging come under what he names an orchestrated assault, programs dismantled, leaders pushed out, whole communities told their voices count for less than they did yesterday, he flatly refuses the quiet despair so many in the field are feeling. His answer is not retreat but construction: the Community Coalition for Sustainable Diversity & Inclusion, a national online home built on the Circle platform where practitioners, advocates, allies, and the people hit hardest by the rollback can stop weathering this storm in isolation and start organizing as one. The whole piece hangs on a single defiant question, what if the most important thing we could do right now is simply refuse to stand alone?

And he doesn't just ask; he leads with his own money on the table. He and ISDI Board Chair Dr. Joseph Marth made the first two gifts themselves, $1,000 toward a $20,000 goal, because, in his words, leadership starts with showing up. From there the appeal builds like a drumbeat: the forces against inclusion are organized, so we must be organized; they spread fear, so we must coordinate hope. Adams lands on the reframe that gives the post its heart, this is not a fundraising campaign, it is an invitation, before he asks readers to give at any level, share widely, and above all send the message that this movement is still here and not giving up. It reads less like a solicitation and more like a rallying cry: urgent, defiant, and unmistakably hopeful. An act of leadership by example.