Otto Lana: A high school student in San Diego, and self-advocate who champions the right to communicate. Otto walks the walk and talks the talk. He has presented at several conferences and served as a Department of Rehabilitation youth leadership delegate in 2021. He lends his voice to policymakers in the California Department of Education in the Build Back Better planning. He has been a guest speaker in college classrooms (San Francisco State University) for graduate students and virtual classrooms (Inclusive Schooling- the gals who started it all for him) for professionals and educators. He has also received some accolades from big names in the disabled community. He is a recipient of the inaugural Heumann-Armstrong Award for Excellence (yes, that is right…Judy Freaking Heumann) and the Harry Servidio Memorial Leadership Award for his work with the Department of Rehabilitation. When he’s not busy with honors courses and public speaking he runs a successful e-commerce website www.ottosmottos.com with his unique brand of wit and positive energy, selling waterproof letterboards he designed for his active lifestyle and apparel sporting the motto “Everyone Belongs Here”. Nothing is more important than the sharing feeling of belonging. And everyone loves merch with a meaning. He does this all using text to talk software. Otto has autism and apraxia. These diagnoses describe him but do not define him. Proceeds from his website fund non-profit organizations that support the right to communication for disabled individuals and provide letterboards to people who cannot afford them. We is you and me. “WEEEEEEEE!” is the feeling of being included. Find your WEEEEEE. Feel the WEEEEEEE. He helps you remember the feeling of a hands up roller coaster flying with no brakes screaming “WEEEEEEEE!” That is what inclusion done right feels like. His most recent work involves changing the depictions of disabled individuals in the media. One of Otto’s Mottos is “Be the type of change you wish to see in others.” He is collaborating with Hollywood’s best to change this image of disabled people on your screens. He wants leading roles for the neurodiverse community, not victims of bullies or caricatures of disheveled nerds.  

Patrick G. Radel is a member of the law firm of Getnick Livingston Atkinson & Priore, LLP, located in Utica, New York.  He received his law degree summa cum laude from the University at Buffalo Law School, where he was the Executive Editor of the Buffalo Law Review. From 2002 to 2004, Mr. Radel served as confidential law clerk to the Honorable William M. Skretny, United States District Judge for the Western District of New York. Mr. Radel is passionate about the rights of people with disabilities and has been honored to represent families of students with disabilities at CSE meetings, in due process proceedings, and in federal court. He is admitted to practice before the United States Supreme Court, the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, the United States District Court for the Northern and Western Districts of New York, and in the courts of New York State.

Mr. Radel is a member of the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates (COPAA), New York State Bar Association, and Oneida County Bar Association. He is a Fellow of the New York Bar Foundation and he is a frequent speaker on the legal rights of students with disabilities. He lives in New Hartford, New York with his wife, Mary Snyder Radel, Esq., and their three sons.