Rabia Khedr

Dispelling myths surrounding people with disabilities

Rabia Khedr did not go to kindergarten and elementary school. Instead, she spent weekdays in front of the television watching Sesame Street and the Dick Van Dyke Show. When her parents finally enrolled her in school at age eight, they informed the school she had ‘weak eyesight.’ The school promptly put her in a learning disabilities class. For two years, she struggled to follow the writings on the chalkboard until one of her teachers finally figured out she was legally blind.

Her eye condition, retinitus pigmentosa, is congenital and causes the gradual degeneration of photoreceptive cells in the retina. When school authorities discovered she did not have a learning disability, they moved her into a regular classroom with 30 children. The transition was not easy. Her classmates teased her relentlessly because she bumped into things and was different.

As the eldest of four siblings, Rabia quickly learnt to lead. “I have two brothers, both of whom have intellectual disabilities and a baby sister with the same eye condition. I had to take on a leadership role in the house out of necessity.” Rabia fought against isolation. Not only did she graduate from high school, she went on to study at the University of Toronto where she majored in Political Science and Industrial Relations.

Rabia also fought to raise awareness around disability issues. When the system was not supportive, she fought it. Eager to take an economics class, she enrolled but was discouraged by the professor. He told her he did not have notes for every lecture. She took the class and failed and failed again on her second try. The third time, with the help of a tutor, she aced the course.

Before university, she had not given diversity or religious identity much thought. At university, she became actively involved with the Muslim Students Association (MSA) where she played a leadership role within the association but never stepped into the limelight. Her activism increased after university. Within days of graduation, she started wearing a hijab which she still wears. “It was coming to terms with the whole package of my identity. If I’m going to have to use a cane to identify myself as blind or legally blind, I also have to be ready to identify myself as Muslim.”

Rabia never imagined she would become so intimately involved with disability-related issues. Between 1995 and 2002, she served and led the Ethno-Racial People with Disabilities Coalition of Ontario (ERDCO).

Her interest in grassroots activism around disabilities developed further when she landed a one-year contract with the Canadian National Institute for the Blind. Later, Employment ACCESS – the Coalition for Persons with Disabilities Peel-Halton-Dufferin, hired her. When she stepped back from Employment ACCESS in late 2001, it was to focus more on her family.

Rabia who is married and has four children, now runs diversityworX, a private consultancy company, which helps organizations promote diversity in their work environment. In October 2005, she wrote a white paper investigating, among other things, the impact of ethno-cultural and faith backgrounds on the lives of mothers with disabilities. In the foreword she wrote, “I got tired of the assumption that individuals with disabilities are dependent on the people in their lives, rather than seeing that people depend on them for their lives. I was inspired to change this misperception.”

Through diversityworX, which she runs out of her home, she has consulted for the Canadian Association for Community Living and Providence Health Care. She sits on the board of the Ontario Women’s Health Network and is a member of the City of Mississauga Accessibility Advisory Committee.

Rabia is devoted to building inclusive communities. She knows it is a goal she can accomplish in Canada, where she has already had success fighting systemic biases against people with disabilities.

Rabia participated in the 2001-2002 Leaders for Change program.