Our Accomplishments at Through the Looking Glass
TLG has developed nationally-recognized model intervention services, received national awards, published landmark books, and had an impact on state and national policy and international practice.
- TLG and its National Center on Parents with Disabilities and their Families advocated for and substantially contributed to the National Council on Disability’s groundbreaking policy study “Rocking the Cradle: Ensuring the Rights of Parents with Disabilities and Their Children.” The report was submitted to President Obama and Congress, and has increased attention on the topic, including the passage of new legislation. Read Rocking the Cradle: Ensuring the Rights of Parents PDF.
- Previous groundbreaking legislation was passed in three states (California, Idaho and Kansas) focusing on improving the lives of parents with disabilities and their children. These were developed using TLG training, technical assistance, and information.
- TLG was a national leader in the creation of more respectful and more strength-based and effective services for children with disabilities or medical issues and their families, established nationally during the 1980’s.
- Since 2002 TLG has provided consultation and training to Head Start and Early Head Start programs.
- Since 2010 TLG has had its own Early Head Start program specializing in inclusion of families with disability in parent or child.
- TLG staff have received national awards for their work at TLG: the Betts (for improving the lives of disabled people worldwide), the Robert Wood Johnson Leadership Award (for national leadership in community health), the Alexander Tymchuk award (for “exemplary contributions to the field of parenting by persons with intellectual disabilities,”) and locally, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the Berkeley Center for Independent Living.
- Two staff have been graduate fellows of ZERO TO THREE’s national leadership initiative.
- Three landmark books have been published by TLG staff.
- TLG has consistently provided services to diverse families—at least 90% families of color, from numerous cultures. Almost half of TLG staff are professionals of color and 70% have personal or family disability experience.
- TLG has received extensive local, national and international media coverage including BBC, NPR, Washington Post, New York Times, S.F. Chronicle, Eye on America, Prime Time Live, Parenting Magazine, Telemundo, and MBC (South Korean television network)
- From 2009 to 2017 TLG awarded 120 scholarships to students whose parent had a disability. Federal funding for the scholarships ended in 2017, but the students’ 5400 narratives about their experiences with the parents are a compelling source of information.
- Almost 2000 of these young adult children of parents with disabilities completed questionnaires about their experiences. Information about this research has been published and has resulted so far in two dissertations.
- TLG has conducted national and international conferences focused on disability and families—all highly rated. It has provided training to more than 225,000 varied professionals, nationally and internationally, in order to improve practice and resources for families with disabilities.
- TLG has provided a training program for psychology interns and post-doctoral trainees since 1990.
- TLG presented and consulted regarding parents with disabilities and their families at the United Nations.
- After many years of visits to TLG from disability systems in Japan, TLG provided training in three regions of Japan.
- TLG’s pioneering development of baby care adaptations has influenced practice nationally; e.g., through direct training of occupational therapists, through purchase of its curricula by graduate occupational therapy programs, and through evaluations in custody cases of parents with disabilities.
- TLG has provided statewide training to Idaho and Kansas child protection systems as well as counties in California, Oregon and Washington.
- TLG analyzed practice of New York City’s child welfare system toward parents with cognitive disabilities.
- TLG staff have served as expert witnesses in custody cases of parents with diverse disabilities in numerous states.
See: Highlights of Previous Trainings, Presentations and Workshops PDF