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Past Episodes of Candace’s Corner

Candace’s Corner is a podcast series where leaders from across the state talk about key issues affecting the disability community.

New episodes release on the first Tuesday of each month. See the full list of past seasons and episodes below.

Season 3 | The History of Developmental Disabilities in Missouri and Creating System Change

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Season 3, Episode 7 (5/5/26) – Wayne Crawford on the History of Disability Housing

Wayne Crawford, executive director of Missouri Inclusive Housing, shares his decades of experience in the disability field and his role in helping people transition from large institutions into homes within their communities.

Together, they explore: 

  • The early days of disability services in Missouri
  • Changing beliefs about where people with disabilities should live
  • The closure of habilitation centers
  • The growth of community-based supports
  • The development of Individualized Supported Living (ISL)
  • The real-life impact of inclusive, community housing

Wayne’s perspective offers a powerful look at how far the system has come and the ongoing work to ensure people with disabilities have safe, affordable places to call home.

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Season 3, Episode 6 – (4/7/26) – Candace talks with Will Hack from Missouri Protection and Advocacy Services (MO P&A). 

Hack works to protect the rights of people with disabilities in Missouri. He helps people understand their rights, especially around guardianship and supports them when they face challenges. He also works to promote supported decision-making, so people can make their own choices with the help they choose.

In his interview, Hack talks about:

  • Missouri Protection and Advocacy (MO P&A)
  • What guardianship means
  • Your rights under guardianship
  • Supported decision-making
  • Changes in Missouri law
  • Resources and support in Missouri

 

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Season 3, Episode 5 (3/3/26) – Candace talks with Tec Chapman, executive vice president and chief program officer at Easterseals Midwest. A disability rights leader with more than 35 years of experience, Chapman has helped shape both state and federal disability policy   through his work with Services for Independent Living and the Missouri Division of Developmental Disabilities.

In his interview, Chapman talks about:

  • How the Missouri Autism Project first got started
  • Why families pushed for change in 1991
  • The service gaps families were facing at the time
  • How grassroots advocacy shaped early autism services
  • What changed after Missouri created rules for the Missouri Autism Projects
  • Major system changes during the last 30 years
  • The power of individuals and families to create lasting system change

Resource Sheet for Tec Chapman

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Season 3, Episode 4 (2/3/26) – Candace talks with Dave Kramer, chief executive officer of the Center for Human Services. He has more than 30 years of experience working with people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. Kramer has worked in direct support roles and management positions. He is active in his community and believes in giving back and helping others.

In his interview, Kramer talks about: 

  • What “deinstitutionalization” means
  • Why individualized support is important
  • What life was historically like for people living in institutions
  • Why helping people move into the community matters
  • How life changes after moving into the community
  • Lessons to remember when people talk about planned or group communities
  • Resource Sheet for Dave Kramer 
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Season 3, Episode 3 (1/6/26) – Candace talks with Laura Cravens, executive director of Boone County Family Resources in Columbia, Missouri. Cravens has spent many years working in the disability field and has dedicated her career to supporting people with disabilities and their families.

Cravens’ work focuses on support coordination, which helps people understand their options, make choices and get the services they need to live in their communities. She has seen how services for people with disabilities have changed over time and has been part of efforts to move away from institutional care toward community-based supports.

In her interview, Cravens talks about:

  • Her career path and leadership role at BCFR
  • What BCFR does
  • What Senate Bill 40 (SB40) is and its impact
  • The meaning of support coordination
  • How case management started and evolved 
  • How services changed from institutional care to community-based supports.
  • Resource Sheet for Laura Cravens
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Season 3, Episode 2 (12/2/25) – Candace talks with Mary Sullivan-Thomas, the executive director of Community Opportunities. Mary has worked in the developmental disabilities field for more than 39 years. She has spent her career helping people with disabilities be seen, heard and supported with respect. In her interview, Sullivan-Thomas talks about:

  • Her career
  • The options for people with disabilities in Missouri in the 1980s
  • What is Individualized Supported Living
  • Her hope for the future of services in Missouri
  • Her advice for making the system better
  • Resource Sheet for Mary Sullivan-Thomas 
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Season 3, Episode 1 (11/4/25) – Candace talks with Bernard Simons, former Director of Missouri’s Division of Developmental Disabilities from 2006-2014. He guided the state’s transition from institutional to community-based supports and helped strengthen the quality and accountability of services for individuals with developmental disabilities. Simons helped moved the system from institutional care to community-based supports. He worked to make services more personal, fair, and focused on helping people live full lives in their communities.

Season 2 | Self-Determination

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Season 2, Episode 5 (10/6/25) – Candace talks with Dominick McKinney, a person with lived experience in developmental disabilities. Dominick lives in Kansas City, Missouri, where he is successfully employed at the AbilityOne Program. In his interview, McKinney talks about:

  • His personal story and background, including growing up in foster care
  • His experience working in a sheltered workshop
  • Transition to community employment through the JobOne Program
  • Reflections on the importance of advocacy and independence
  • Insights into how meaningful work has impacted his life
  • Resource Sheet for Dominick McKinney
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Season 2, Episode 4 (9/2/25) – Self-Determination: Your Rights and Resources to Inclusive Living in Your Community. Candace talks with Katheryne Staeger-Wilson and Sangyeal Lee of the Missouri Developmental Disabilities Council (MODDC).

Staeger-Wilson is a program coordinator for MODDC and has professionally worked in disability advocacy for more than 30 years. Her passion is to encourage others to think differently about disability issues through a disability studies lens, honoring the lived experience of disability when creating social justice and inclusive change.

Born and raised in Daegu, South Korea, Sangyeal Lee is a community leader and a technology enthusiast with a career spanning more than two decades, combining deep engagement with civic organizations and public service. Lee earned a bachelor’s degree in public law from Daegu University and a Master of Business Administration from Missouri State University. He is a MODDC council member and chairman of the Olmstead Sub-Committee.

In their interview, Staeger-Wilson and Lee talk about:

  • The Missouri Developmental Disabilities Council
  • The U.S. Supreme Court’s 1999 Olmstead Decision on unjustified segregation, and why it matters for people with disabilities in Missouri
  • MODDC’s Olmstead Sub-Committee and The Missouri Olmstead White Paper
  • Home and Community-based Services (HCBS)
  • Resource Sheet for Katheryne Staeger-Wilson and Sangyal Lee
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Season 2, Episode 3 (8/4/25) – Candace talks with Chris Worth, a public speaker who presents on topics of disability, disability culture, risk-taking, and creativity. He is also a doctoral student at the University of Missouri–St. Louis, where he studies the positive aspects of risk-taking and what creativity may or may not do to enhance a person’s positive risk. In his interview, Worth talks about:

  • The meaning of self-determination
  • The meaning of dignity of risk
  • The relation of dignity of risk and self determination
  • The reason that the dignity of risk is important for everyone – especially for people with disabilities
  • Self-determination relates to the disability movement
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Season 2, Episode 2 (6/9/25) – An Academic Look at Self-Determination with Ben Edwards

Candace talks with Ben Edwards, assistant researcher at the Kansas University Center on Disabilities, a disability research center with a strong team of leaders in the field of special education, disability supports and services, and inclusive research. In his interview, Edwards talks about: 

  1. What is Self-Determination 
  2. Are there different components of self-determination 
  3. How can self-determination be used in a person personal and professional life 
  4. The Self-Determined Learning Model of Instruction or SDLMI 
  5. How self-determination relate to the disability rights movement 
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Season 2, Episode 1 (5/6/25) – Self-Determination: “Being in Charge of Your Life” with StationMD’s Dr. Deven Unadkat. 

Candace sits down with Dr. Unadkat, president and chief medical officer of StationMD which provides medical care for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (I/DD) whenever and wherever they need it in the U.S. In his interview, Dr. Unadkat talks about:

  • What Station MD is and what it does
  • What inspired the creation of StationMD
  • How StationMD works to make telehealth accessible to everyone
  • View the Resource Sheet

Season 1 | Employment

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Season 1, Episode 6 (4/1/25) – In our sixth episode of Candace’s Corner, Candace talks to Sandy Keyser, an Employment First specialist at the Missouri Department of Mental Health-Division of Developmental Disabilities. In her interview, Keyser talks about:

  • Her role at the Department of Mental Health Division of Developmental Disabilities
  • Whether people can still receive disability benefits when they work
  • The Social Security Administration incentives that support individuals with disabilities who work and how to retain necessary benefits
  • The role of an employment first specialist
  • View the Missouri Benefits Information Sheet.
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Season 1, Episode 5 (3/4/25) – In our fifth episode, Candace talks with Emily Hartley, executive director of the Missouri Developmental Disabilities Council, and George Gotto, director of the University of Missouri-Kansas City’s Institute for Human Development. The UMKC-IHD is Missouri’s University Center of Excellence for Developmental Disabilities (UCEDD). In their interview, Hartley and Gotto talk about: 

  • The Missouri Developmental Disabilities Council (MODDC) 
  • MODDC and UMKC-IHD’s relationship with the Missouri Developmental Disability Network 
  • The MODDC five-year plan purpose 
  • An important listening session and online survey  
  • A statewide needs assessment and who has a vested interest to participate
  • View the Missouri Statewide Needs Assessment Information Sheet
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Season 1, Episode 4 (2/4/25) – In our fourth episode, Candace talks with David Hoff, program director with the Institute for Community Inclusion at the University of Massachusetts-Boston about informed choice and employment. Every day, people make informed choices whether they notice it or not. In his interview, Hoff talks about:

  • The Institute for Community Inclusion’s (ICI) focus at the University of Massachusetts-Boston focus
  • The role of ICI in Missouri
  • Informed choice meaning
  • The steps for informed choice
  • Who should be involved with a person’s informed choice
  • View the Informed Choice and Employment Information Sheet. 
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Season 1, Episode 3 – (1/7/25) – Candace talks with Stacy Morse, project coordinator with the Missouri Developmental Disabilities Council. in her interview, Morse talks about:

  • Missouri Disability Benefits 101
  • Who should use DB 101
  • What are the different programs
  • Ticket to Work Webinar
  • Benefits Planning Estimators
  • Resources:
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Season 1, Episode 2 (12/3/24) – Join Candace as she interviews Kim Buckman, director of Employment and Community Engagement with the Missouri Division of Developmental Disabilities (Div of DD). In her interview, Buckman talks about:

  • Her role at the Missouri Division of Developmental Disabilities (MODDD)
  • Employment services available
  • Goals for employment in Missouri
  • Employment First
  • How a person gets started with employment
  • Employment success stories
  • Read the full information sheet.
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Season 1, Episode 1 – (11/5/24) – What is People First? Susan Parker, president of People First of Missouri, talks about the organization and its affiliated chapters and how People First has supported her in her advocacy journey. 

Resources:

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