It should come as no surprise that during my travels I came upon many people who would be considered to be living in extreme poverty by the standards of those of us living in the United States. Even knowing this full well before embarking on my trip, at times, seeing the reality was jarring.
I have always considered myself to live a modest life. I believed that my needs were simple and my desire for possessions was limited. I chose a career in a field that isn’t exactly known for its high rate of pay, so I never viewed myself as “rich.”
But when confronted with the reality of what it meant to be middle class in Africa, or worse yet, what it meant to be poor in Africa, I had to re-assess my own view of my position in life. I had to acknowledge the fact that I actually live a very privileged life.
I know that statement can seem kind of obvious. Of course I understood, even before traveling to Africa, how the standard of living in our country was far higher than that of most countries in the world. But that kind of high level understanding is very different than seeing that difference first-hand. Somehow, encountering that reality face to face made me recognize how different my life is from most of my fellow world citizens. My privilege was suddenly very apparent.
Which started me to thinking about privilege and what it means. Or what it should mean. Sometimes people who end up in privilege don’t know what to do with it. They can become protective and territorial as they try to hold on to that privilege at all costs. Others, however, believe that with privilege comes a responsibility to use that privilege in ways that may lead to the betterment of others. I unashamedly put myself into that latter category.
I think Imagine! is a privileged organization. We are fortunate to have a workforce that, from the various levels of management to the Direct Service Providers, is smart, dedicated, creative, and engaged in looking for the best ways possible to provide opportunities for the individuals we serve to become more self-sufficient. There are many provider organizations that offer excellent services and are staffed by dedicated and compassionate people. But I genuinely believe that Imagine! is privileged in a way many of those other organizations are not.
Logically, then, I believe that Imagine! has a certain responsibility to use our privilege to work to improve our entire system of funding and delivering services. If you look at our organization I think you will find that we do that in many ways and at many times. For just one example, I point to our exploration of technology as a way to be more effective and efficient in our service delivery. We took this path quite some time ago, and encountered (and continue to encounter) challenging resistance along the way. Despite that, and despite a funding system that doesn’t support work to look at alternative ways to deliver services, we have become one of the very few organizations when it comes to discussing how technology can be used to improve the lives of individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.
Case in point: just this past Friday, representatives from the Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Financing (HCPF) took a tour of Imagine!’s Bob and Judy Charles SmartHome in Boulder (see picture below).
As the rule makers and regulators are coming more and more to accept that technology can and must be part of services in the future, they are looking to find experts and those with experience in using technological tools as they create the roadmap for services in the future. They are coming to Imagine!, and we are happy to help.
I don’t want to oversell this. Like all organizations, Imagine! has areas where we aren’t as successful as we could or should be when it comes to sharing our knowledge, our skill, and our experience with others so that the people we serve can live fulfilling lives in their homes and communities. But overall, we are privileged to have a work culture where we want to share our bounty of understanding and know-how with others. We are rightly proud of our privilege, and we are willing to share it. In the end, I think we all benefit from that attitude.
Then again, what do I know?
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