LEAPING WATER CONSULTING​

I've witnessed Rebel's work as a community organizer, thinker and disability justice and racial/ survivor justice movement worker, and collaborated with him, for the last 5-10 years. I am always struck by his clarity, honesty, generosity and how hard he works to bring people together, always coming up with disabled Black innovative solutions and strategies to get people what they need. He excels at horizontal and facilitative leadership and is extraordinarily good at talking to and listening to people and working to help folks see themselves as the leaders they already are and gain skills along the way.

Rebel does a great job combining a few key aspects in effective justice work: he often leads with an honest, but disarming kind of humor that makes truth telling and radical honesty more accessible. He also brings great care to his work, making sure each person knows their perspectives matter, that they matter. He is direct and uses his own resilience and courage in powerful ways to help others understand their own power and how to use it to heal and build up the larger community.

Our community was blown away by the way Deanna and Rebel modeled an accessible presentation and space for all participants. Participants expressed feeling more courage to engage in equity work. At the same time, the social justice truths they spoke were received as prophetic and deeply spiritual.  We are attempting to integrate practices they modeled for us, like access check-ins, frequent five minute breaks, and slowing down. Even though we're a "disability organization" and move slowly in many realms, we are often tempted to move quickly where we can. Deanna and Rebel helped us remember the power of slowing down, both to increase accessibility, and to serve as an antidote to white, ableist culture.

I collaborated with Deanna Yadollahi as I was serving as a disability access consultant for AERA, one of the largest annual academic conferences. Deanna offered invaluable edits and proved to be an expert in thinking through cutting edge access strategies while diving into the most complex and challenging elements of accommodations that aimed to go far beyond compliance. Always advocating for access through a disability justice lens, they were easy to work with, patient, and responsive.

Deanna Yadollahi is a force to be reckoned with! They did an amazing accessibility review for us and provided invaluable resources from their wealth of knowledge. Their expertise has really helped us in our development journey and their work was thorough, professional, and precise. As a person, Deanna is a joy to work with and communicates well. I'd recommend for everyone to work with Deanna, especially if they want to make a big difference in their organization or personally. Thank you for everything Deanna!