Congratulations to John Tschida, appointed as the new Director of the National Institute on Disability and Rehabilitation Research!
Mr. Tschida comes to NIDRR from the Courage Center, which recently merged with Sister Kenny Rehabilitation Institute to form the Courage Kenny Rehabilitation Institute (CKRI) in Minneapolis MN, where he served as vice president for public affairs and research. There he built and led an integrated team of policy and research professionals. The goal was to fund, develop and evaluate innovative programming that blurred the lines between medical and social supports to focus on individual health and social participation outcomes. As a person with a spinal cord injury, he has personal as well as professional experience in issues of disability and access, and his work was deeply rooted in raising public awareness and aligning state law to support people living as independently as possible. Mr. Tschida also has served on a number of public and private boards designing policy or governance solutions to further the independence of people with disabilities, and worked closely with the Minnesota Consortium for Citizens with Disabilities. He has written numerous articles on disability, healthcare, and public policy for national and local news outlets and magazines.
Mr. Tschida returns to the DC area, where he was a Health Policy Research Fellow under the auspices of the National Rehabilitation Hospital’s (NRH) Rehabilitation Research and Training Center on Disability and Managed Care funded by NIDRR (1997-2001). Mr. Tschida’s fellowship included acquiring his MPP degree in health policy at Georgetown University Graduate Program in Public Policy and doing his practicum at the NRH Research Center.
Mr. Tschida will join the NIDRR staff effective February 25th. We look forward to assisting him in his new role!
Mr. Tschida follows K. Charlie Lakin, PhD, as director of NIDRR. Dr. Lakin served as director from 2011 to February 2014. All of us at NARIC wish him the very best with his next endeavor.