In 2008, youth and self-advocates from across Washington State collaborated with Senator Rosemary McAuliffe (D-1st District) to draft legislation to include disability history and the disability civil rights movement in K-12 public school and higher education curriculum. This group of young advocates successfully lobbied the legislature, with overwhelming support from both the House and Senate. Governor Gregoire signed the bill, Senate Bill 6313, into law on March 26, 2008, as well as proclaimed October as Disability History Awareness Month in Washington State. 

The successful passage of the Disability History Awareness Month legislation is the culmination of many years of hard work and advocacy by citizens in Washington State to create new policies that support people with disabilities.  

It wasn't until 1971 that students with disabilities were allowed to access public school education. That changed when four moms, turned activists, wrote the first civil rights legislation in the United States called Education for All or HB 90. These courageous parents Cecile Lindquist, Katie Dolan, Evelyn Chapman, and Janet Taggart worked tirelessly to pass the Education for All legislation to ensure that all students with disabilities had equal rights and equal access to public school education. Their bill, Education for All, soon became law in several other states, and laid the framework for the federal civil rights law known as Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), that now governs the civil rights of students with disabilities.