Ann Costello, Director of the Golisano Foundation presented the Foundation’s 2018 Move to Include Award today to Rick Rader, MD, Director of the Morton J. Kent Habilitation Center at Orange Grove Center and Editor in Chief of the award-winning Exceptional Parent Magazine.

The Move to Include Award is given to those who both “believe” and “act” in the purest realm of the essence of “move to include.”

Costello presented the award at the annual American Academy of Developmental Medicine and Dentistry’s (AAMD)  One Voice Igniting Change Conference when she had the honor of introducing Dr. Rader, the luncheon keynote.

“Dr. Rick Rader believes and acts in the purest realm of the essence of move of include; in sanctity, value and merit of together; and who knows that “together” transcends inclusion,” said Costello, who added that Rader was not only present at the Awards launch in 2015 but also wrote the award’s description and meaning.

“I am in need of your creative services,” she said, and told him about the Golisano Foundation’s 30th anniversary celebration, when Foundation would give a new award called “Move to Include,” asking if he would help write the meaning or purpose of the award.

Rader wrote back in a couple days with a draft description, adding, “Before you read it I have some thoughts. This is a little out of the box and I don’t suppose you will touch it with a 10 foot pole but I thought about this carefully. I don’t think you want something mundane, politically correct or “oh-hum.”  I can scrape it, modify it or start again. But I did want you to see this as it represents an unabashed feeling. So in the event (and I know you will be honest) this is viewed as “are you kidding” let me know.”

It starts out with “Move to Include” – an award that challenges its very name.
Costello read it and re-read it and said, “I loved it. I didn’t change a single word.”

About Dr. Rader

At the Morton J. Kent Habilitation Center at Orange Grove in Chattanooga TN, Dr. Rader is engaged as a medical futurist – predicting the future medical problems of people with neurodevelopmental disabilities. He is cross trained in internal medicine and medical anthropology.

Exceptional Parent Magazine is a nationally acclaimed journal focusing on the education of parents and professionals supporting individuals with special needs.
Dr. Rader has received numerous national awards for excellence in health care publishing and has published over one hundred articles on developmental disabilities.

Dr. Rader was appointed the first Special Liaison for Family Health Care at the President’s Committee for People with Intellectual Disabilities. He has served as an advisor to two Surgeon Generals in the field of health care for people with disabilities. He is on the Board of the American Association for Health and Disability and is president of the American Academy of Developmental Medicine and Dentistry.

He is a fellow of the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities and a member of the Scientific Advisory Board of the International Brain Research Foundation. Dr. Rader serves on the editorial advisory board of the International Journal of Nursing in Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities and is on the board of MOVE International. He is a mentor to Project DOCC, a parent driven educational program teaching physicians the realities of caring for a child with special healthcare needs. He is an adjunct professor of Human Development at the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga, and a member of the Research Consortium for Sensory Integration Studies.

Dr. Rader is a founding member of the board and first president of the American Association for Multi- Sensory Environments (AAMSE) and a co-founder of the Initiative for the Defeat of Stigma.

About the Award – An Award that challenges its very name

Written by Rick Rader, MD, Co-Founder, American Association of Developmental Medicine and Dentistry
Samuel Beckett, the novelist and poet observed, “Words are all we have.” If that is true then we need to be mindful of those we use.

The disability field is fond of the word “include,” believing it refers to society embracing and celebrating value in human diversity.  The reality is that the word is derived from the Latin word meaning “to shut in, enclose.” It can mean to “make room for,” “take into account,” “work in,” “accommodate,” and “admit.” All of which, does not describe the Golisano Foundation’s Move to Include Award.

This Award is not given to individuals and organizations that strive to “fit people in,” and “make room” for people with intellectual disabilities. The Award is not intended to honor the movement to include people despite their disabilities; and certainly not because of their disabilities

The Golisano Move to Include Award was designed to demonstrate that inclusion should never be an afterthought, a “make room” effort or a “do over” effort in social justice. The Award points out that in our society there are individuals and organizations that understand that inclusion, true inclusion is not something that is created through a mission statement, a tagline or a bumper sticker. The Move to Include Award celebrates the “movement” – the arduous and tenacious movement  –  that strives to embrace people, not as an afterthought, and equally important to move the psyche of individuals, systems, communities and societies that will one day eliminate the need to offer awards noteworthy for succeeding in “allowing people; people with novelties” to be welcomed into the fold.

We do not learn anything by simply “including,” “allowing,“ or “permitting” others to live and work alongside of us. We do not profit or grow by “accepting,” or even “welcoming” people with disabilities.

We, as a neighborhood, community and society learn, grow and profit by “believing” in the sanctity, value and merit of “together.” The essence of “together” transcends “inclusion.”  The Golisano Award belongs to those who believe that being together, not by mandate, statute or fiat; is the only way we can benefit from the joys, challenges and perspectives that “believing in being together” can be promoted and realized.

The Golisano Move to Include Award is given to those who both “believe” and “act” in the purest realm of the essence of “move to include.” It is given in the hope that the understanding of “include” can be elevated, promoted, ingrained and demonstrated at the highest levels of human behavior.