Congratulations to Anat Caspi on receiving the 2023 Human Rights Education Award from the Seattle Human Rights Commission!
Caspi is a CREATE associate director and the founder and director of the Taskar Center for Accessible Technology. About the award she said, “I have always thought making an impact on local communities is where it starts,” said Caspi. “The Seattle commission’s focus on disability rights as civil rights serve as a reminder of the importance of collaborative efforts in creating a more inclusive and just society.” She emphasized that it also celebrates the collective efforts of the Taskar Center community.
Those efforts range from the expansive — mapping the accessibility of miles of urban infrastructure — to those of a more human scale. For example, the Taskar Center partnered with not-for-profit Provail Therapy Center to create a library of adapted technology for people with different abilities to borrow for free. The 800 artifacts in the Pacific Northwest Adaptive Technology Library were either donated or created through community education events, where volunteers don protective goggles and get a crash-course in safe use of a soldering iron before adapting battery-operated toys to be switch-accessible for players of different abilities.
Watch as Olivia Quesada accepts the award on Caspi’s behalf at the ceremony.