Disabled social worker · bridging disability, access & advocacy
Disability speaking for helping professionals, organizations & communities
Keynotes, workshops, and sessions on disability, access, advocacy, and disability justice for social workers, therapists, healthcare providers, educators, nonprofits, and community audiences who want to reduce barriers and create more ethical, accessible, inclusive, and responsive environments.
● In-person · virtual · hybrid ● Audiences from 60 to 2,000 ● NASW National & NSWM featured speaker
— Why this work matters
Beyond vague awareness, into real settings
Disability and access affect how people experience services, events, classrooms, communication, care, and community life every day. Tessa’s speaking helps audiences move beyond vague awareness and look at what disability, access, advocacy, and justice mean in the real settings where people work, learn, gather, and receive support.
These sessions are designed to be practical, grounded, and relevant to everyday decisions: how teams communicate, how systems create barriers, how accommodations are handled, how disabled people are understood, and how organizations and communities can respond more ethically and effectively.
— About Tessa Bathauer, LMSW
Lived experience, social work values & systems thinking
Tessa Bathauer, LMSW, is a disabled social worker, consultant, educator, advocate, and founder of NeoBilities, a practice focused on disability education, accessibility, and practical support for helping professionals and organizations. Her work includes custom disability trainings, CE-style education, online courses, organizational review, advocacy-informed guidance, and public speaking on disability-related topics.
She holds an MSSW from The University of Texas at Austin, with portfolios in Critical Disability Studies and Nonprofit Management. She brings together lived disability experience, social work values, disability advocacy, and systems thinking to help audiences connect disability and access to real-world decisions, relationships, policies, and culture.
Her work is also informed by disability justice, including attention to power, exclusion, lived experience, and the ways systems shape access and harm. Her sessions do not treat disability as a checklist issue alone, but as a human, cultural, ethical, and structural issue that affects practice, policy, events, education, and community life.
— Past speaking experience
Selected venues & programs
Tessa has presented at national and state social work conferences, university programs, healthcare education settings, nonprofit trainings, and community events — delivering seminars and workshops for audiences ranging from 60 to 2,000 participants.
— Sample talks
Sessions Tessa is known for
Navigating Disability in Everyday Practice: Beyond Checklists and Inspiration
A practice-focused session for social workers, therapists, and helping professionals who want clearer ways to respond to disability and access needs in appointments, programs, and services. Participants explore real-world scenarios involving communication, accommodations, barriers, and follow-through.
The 7 Pillars of Disability Inclusion: From Framework to Action
A structured approach to disability inclusion in organizations and services, connecting big-picture concepts to policies, communication, workflows, participant experience, and meaningful action.
Disability, Ethics, Advocacy & Access: Making Tough Calls in Real Time
An ethics-centered talk for professionals and leaders navigating disability-related decisions, exploring tensions between policy, access, autonomy, support, and organizational constraints through case-style examples.
Disability & Neurodiversity in Clinical and Educational Settings
Grounded in Tessa’s academic and healthcare speaking experience, this session explores how disability and neurodiversity affect clinical care, supervision, education, and learning environments.
Building Accessible Events and Conferences: What Organizers Need to Know
A practical talk for planners, associations, universities, and nonprofits on registration, communication, physical space, session access, virtual and hybrid access, and real-time problem-solving.
Disabled Social Workers Speak: Experience, Growth & Organizational Change
Explores disability within the social work profession and what organizations, schools, and supervisors can do to better support disabled professionals and students — framed through disability justice, advocacy, and professional culture.
Also available: Social Work Entrepreneurship and Disability: Building Practice That Fits — for students,
emerging professionals, and leadership or innovation audiences.
— Signature themes
Common themes across
Tessa’s speaking
— What audiences walk away with
Reflection and action — not just inspiration
Participants leave with stronger language for talking about disability and access, greater awareness of how barriers show up in their specific setting, and more practical ideas for improving services, communication, events, or internal processes.
Depending on the session, audiences may also leave with a deeper understanding of disability culture, key disability frameworks, and the role of lived experience in shaping ethical, accessible practice — and how advocacy, disability justice, systems, power, and culture all influence access.
Formats
Ways to work together
Audiences Tessa speaks with
Who she works with.
— FAQ
Planner questions
Do you offer both virtual and in-person speaking?
Can sessions be tailored to our audience or theme?
Do you offer CE-friendly session information?
Can speaking be paired with other services?
What kinds of events do you speak at?
— How to inquire
Bring disability, access, advocacy & justice into the center of your event
Share a few details about your audience, setting, and goals — your organization and event, the date or timeframe and location, audience type and estimated attendance, the format you’re considering, and any access or logistical details — and we can explore a speaking format that fits your needs.
Request a speaking engagement
