November 21, 2019 | Christine Liao, Programs Manager
Christine Liao is the Programs Manager at the American Association of People with Disabilities (AAPD). She coordinates and implements all of AAPD’s national programs, including the Summer Internship Program, Disability Mentoring Day, AAPD Paul G. Hearne Leadership Awards, Disability Rights Storytellers Fellowship, and NBCUniversal Tony Coelho Media Scholarship. These duties will help support AAPD’s mission to serve as a convener, connector, and catalyst for change, increasing the political and economic power of people with disabilities. Please see below to learn more about Christine.
AAPD is excited to announce Christine Liao as their new Programs Manager! In this role, she will coordinate and implement all of AAPD’s national programming. Some of Christine’s priorities include diversity and inclusion, intersectionality, and empowering the next generation of leaders. In the past six years, Christine has been dedicated to creating programmatic opportunities and spaces for emerging leaders to explore their leadership with a disability framework. Since starting her new role in the beginning of November 2019, Christine shares, “I’m excited to be at AAPD not just because of their work of changing systems to be more inclusive, but because they empower emerging leaders with disabilities to lead the change.”
Prior to joining AAPD, Christine worked at the Association of University Centers on Disabilities (AUCD). She collaborated with diverse stakeholders to rebrand and strengthen the infrastructure of the AUCD Emerging Leaders Community, an initiative that serves as a professional home to thousands of current and former trainees and early career professionals. She also provided technical assistance to 64 federally-funded interdisciplinary training programs aimed to enhance the clinical and leadership skills of professionals who serve children with disabilities and their families.
Christine has extensive experience serving the deaf and disability communities in mental health, health care, academic, and community settings in both of her native languages, American Sign Language and English. She has supported deaf refugees through a global non-governmental organization, deaf children and adults with developmental and other disabilities, and adults who became deaf due to brain and/or physical injury. Through these activities, Christine gained experienced in universal design, program planning, community outreach, and community organizing; she also developed expertise in disseminating information using technology accessible to a variety of audiences.
Christine earned her MSW from Arizona State University’s School of Social Work, with an emphasis on policy, planning and community organizing. She holds a BS degree in Psychology with a minor in American Sign Language from the University of Washington.