Green Mountain Self Advocates

Green Mountain self-advocates (gmsa) organizes an annualconference, "voices and choices," in burlington, vt. Established in 1998, this event hasgrown to become the largest disability gathering in Vermont, attracting participantsfrom every county in the state and beyond. The april 2023 conference had 560attendees, including vermonters with developmental disabilities, their families,dedicated service providers, and supportive allies. "voices and choices" serves as aunique platform for collective learning, emphasizing crucial aspects of decision-making,self-advocacy, and relationships. The conference had more than 25 workshops that aimto empower individuals with developmental disabilities and create an inclusive space forfamilies, service providers, and allies to come together, share experiences, and enhancetheir understanding of self-advocacy.

Special projects includes payments for consultatons, trainings, partcipation on advisorycommittees and honorariums for presentations. Typically, these projects are contracts withorganizations who pay a set fee for agreed upon deliverables. For example: $500 for akeynote. Most of these payments are for onetime events or projects. Green Mountain selfadvocates employs and supports people with intellectual and developmental disabilities toprepare for and partcipate in these activities.

Self-advocacy projectthe self-advocacy project enables gmsa to staff a statewide office to provide technical assistance to local groups, and training opportunities that help people with developmental disabilities to master self-determination skills. Here are examples of our accomplishments: - provide virtual technical assistance visits, peer mentoring and support for hundreds of self-advocates who belong to more than 20 local-self advocacy groups. - training for board members on board money management. - disability awareness training for schools, colleges, medical students, and government agencies. - supporting people with disabilities to participate on advisory boards. Technical assistance to peer leaders to train direct support professionals.- gmsa successfully worked with family organizations to virtually present leadership training.