Explore the key issues on the table for policymakers this year and ways our collective efforts can build momentum for the long haul on top policy issues facing people who are blind or have low vision. Advocates and thought leaders share where progress has been made and where we still need to go, from strengthening vital core services to breaking down barriers to inclusion and independence in our rapidly changing world.
Presenters
Stephanie Enyart
Chief Public Policy and Research Officer, American Foundation for the Blind
Stephanie Enyart is a disability rights leader with 20 years of experience advocating for people with disabilities. She currently serves as American Foundation for the Blind's Chief Public Policy & Research Officer. She launched the AFB Public Policy and Research Institute, which conducts mixed-methods research that informs AFB's policy advocacy. She provides strategic leadership for the policy and research functions across the key focus areas of education, employment, technology, and transportation. In April 2023, President Biden appointed her to serve on the US Access Board.
Ms. Enyart currently leads a cross-disability coalition advocating for regulatory clarity and legislative solutions to the inaccessibility of websites and applications. Prior to AFB, she was the Disability & Inclusion Advisor at the Corporation for National and Community Service, where she provided thousands of nonprofit grantee organizations with inclusion guidance and resources. She advocated for the disability community as a Skadden Foundation Fellow for Disability Rights Advocates and the Judge David L. Bazelon Center for Mental Health Law.
Ms. Enyart spent over a decade working in state and federal government and has extensive expertise in nonprofit and community organizing. Ms. Enyart holds a BA from Stanford University and a JD from the UCLA School of Law where she served as an Editor-in-Chief of Recent Developments for the UCLA Women's Law Journal. During law school, she also founded the National Association of Law Students with Disabilities and served as its first President. Ms. Enyart is blind and is a proud mother to two daughters.
Sarah Malaier
Senior Advisor, Public Policy & Research, American Foundation for the Blind
Sarah Malaier, who joined AFB in 2016, leads strategy for the organization's public policy advocacy and contributes to research initiatives through analysis, advocacy, and human subjects protections. Working on a broad portfolio of issues, she has advocated for accessible transportation, prepared letters urging Congress and the Department of Education to protect the rights of students who are blind or have low vision during COVID-19, and developed a scan of employment services in the blindness field.
Sarah serves as Co-Chair for the Consortium of Citizens with Disabilities Transportation Task Force, a cross-disability coalition that advocates with the federal government for accessible, affordable, and effective transportation for people with disabilities. She also chairs AFB's Institutional Review Board.
Previously, Sarah contributed to AFB's advocacy to prevent the watering down of the Americans with Disabilities Act, coordination of fly-in days for the Cogswell-Macy Act, and the development of the 21st Century Agenda on Aging and Vision Loss, among other advocacy efforts.
Sarah holds an MA in International Relations and Economics from Johns Hopkins University and a BA in Political Science and German from the University of Alabama.
Jason Eckert
VP & COO, VisionServe Alliance
Jason Eckert joined Vision Serve Alliance in 2023 and became Vice President and Chief Operating Officer in early 2024.
He has 25 years of professional experience in the Blind and Vision Impaired community. He is widely regarded for his skills in working closely with providers and community partners to remove impediments to success and foster the development of innovative, goal-oriented programs.
Jason began his career as a Rehabilitation Counselor providing career services at Lighthouse International (now Lighthouse Guild). In 2000, he joined the New York State Commission for the Blind, where he rose to become Downstate Regional Coordinator, a position he held for seven years.
From 2021 to 2023, Jason served as the Executive Director at the Readers Digest Partners for Sight Foundation.
Jason holds many postgraduate certifications in counseling, has completed several government executive training programs, and has received many management and leadership awards. He has lectured widely on topics related to blindness and vision impairment. Jason earned an MA in Counseling and a BA in Psychology with a secondary field of study in Special Education from George Washington University.
Claire Stanley
Director of Advocacy and Governmental Affairs, American Council of the Blind
Claire Stanley is the Director of Advocacy and Governmental Affairs for the American Council of the Blind (ACB). She graduated from the University of California Irvine Law School in 2015 and has worked in several disability advocacy roles since then. Previous to working at ACB, she was a Public Policy Specialist for the National Disability Rights Network (NDRN) where she regularly lobbied on Capitol Hill for the rights of persons with disabilities. She serves at the vice chair of the Consortium of Constituents with Disabilities (CCD), a membership organization of over one-hundred different disability advocacy organizations who advocate for the rights of people with disabilities to Congress and the federal government. Claire is blind and has a yellow lab guide dog named Tulane.
