• The Partner Agencies:

• Bay Area Outreach and Recreation Program (BORP)

• Center for Accessible Technology (CforAT)

• Center for Independent Living (CIL)

• Computer Technologies Program (CTP)

• Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund (DREDF)

• Through the Looking Glass (TLG)

• World Institute on Disability (WID)

Through the Looking Glass (TLG) is a nationally recognized center for research, training and intervention services to families in which a parent or child has a disability. Founded as a non-profit organization in 1982, TLG's mission has been to create and encourage resources which are empowering and non-pathological. The name of Through the Looking Glass incorporates a vision of "seeing through" to the other side and emphasizing a life cycle approach which integrates the perspectives of adults and parents with disabilities with parents of disabled children. Ed Roberts served as Chair of TLG's Board of Directors for many years.

Through the Looking Glass has pioneered clinical and supportive services, training and research serving families in which a parent or child has a disability or medical issue. Within the Bay Area, TLG provides in-home intervention services to families including infant/parent and family therapy, developmental services, parenting technology, and support groups.

TLG has conducted numerous local and national research projects on families including twelve national research projects under its Rehabilitation Research and Training on Families of Adults with Disabilities, several projects on adaptive baby care equipment, and its latest national project on parents with disabilities and their adolescent children.

In 1998, TLG was funded by the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research, U.S. Department of Education, to be the first National Resource Center for Parents with Disabilities. This National Center provides technical assistance, information, referral and training concerning the nearly 9 million U.S. families in which one or both parents have a disability. The Center's resources are particularly focused on four critical parenting issues: custody; pregnancy and birthing; adoption; and adaptive baby care equipment.

TLG's staff and consultants include international experts in disability and family issues across a wide spectrum of professional disciplines. The diversity of professional experience is matched by diverse disability experience -- over 80% of the staff have a disability, or are the parent, child, spouse or sibling of a person with a disability. Megan Kirshbaum, founder and Executive Director of TLG, has been a clinician for families in the disability community for 24 years. She was the recipient of the national 1994 Betts Award which recognizes her pioneering efforts towards parents with disabilities and their families. Stephanie Miyashiro, member of TLG's Board of Directors and former President of the Board of the Hawaii Centers for Independent Living, is an activist in the disability and Japanese-American communities and a dancer with the Thais Mazur Dance Company. Paul Preston, Co-Director of the National Resource Center for Parents with Disabilities, is a medical anthropologist and author of the landmark national study of deaf parents and their children, Mother Father Deaf.

Contact Information
2198 Sixth Street, Suite 100
Berkeley, CA 94710-2204
(510) 848-1112 FAX: (510) 848-4445
Toll Free, outside the Bay Area: 1-800-644-2666 (voice);
1-800-804-1616 (TTY)
Email: tlg@lookingglass.org
Website: www.lookingglass.org