Rae is a primary school teacher in Brisbane, Queensland. She works in an integrated school and has taught a number of children with various types of disability. She herself has a lower back problem and some vision impairment.
Rae has been involved in the Disability Rights movement for many years and joined Queensland Disabled Peoples International in 1985. She has held various offices on the state committee and was their state representative on the National Council of DPI (Aust)from 1986 until DPI (A) closed it door in 1995. At a national level she has worked on various sub committees and held various Executive positions. She has been the editor of "Our Voice" national magazine for DPI (A).
She has also been involved in DPI on the international especially in the Asia Pacific Region. She has attended many international meetings and conferences including meetings held with the United Nations, Economic and Social Commition for Asia and the Pacific. In 1998 she attend the ESCAP Experts Meeting for Training the Trainers to Promote a Non Handicapping Environment, held in Thailand.
She has a special interest in the area of Women with Disabilities and chaired the steering committee, which formed Women with Disabilities Australia, becoming that organizations first President following incorporation. She has also been involved in this area at an international level.
In 1992 Rae represented DPI Asia/Pacific Region at the First International Symposium of Disability and the Environment held as part of the Non Government Organizations' conference on the Environment, Global Forum , Rio de Janerio, Brazil. DPI world only funded three representative to attend this conference and Rae was the only woman. It was here that she presented her first paper on the effects of environmental problems on people with disability, a subject on which she has since delivered many papers. It is an area in which she has a special personal interest as she one, of her two daughters and her grandson all suffer from various forms of allergy difficulties. Rae has been elected at the first secretary for Disability Australia and is its female international representive.
Unit 4, 65 York Street, Richmond Victoria 3121, Australia, Tel: 61-3-9429 4210 Fax: 61-3-9201 9499
Last updated by frank HB on 17-05-99