Disability Pride Month 2026

Banner for Disability Pride Month

Image description: Banner for Disability Pride Month. Graphic has muted black background. The text reads, "July is... Disability Pride Month." The text is off-white except for the word 'Pride' with the color of each letter presenting the colors in the disability pride flag: red, yellow, white, blue, green. In the bottom right corner is the DOC logo and the WWU logo.

For Disability Pride Month, the Disability Outreach Center, in collaboration with the Neurodiversity Inclusion Collaborative and Disability Employee Resource Group, will have a variety of events and programming throughout July for students, faculty, staff, and community members. The Western Libraries will also be highlighting books in a Disability Pride Display and the DOC is hosting a Disability Pride Social Media Campaign throughout the month!

Events and Programming

View the Disability Pride Flag hanging on the Viking Union Skybridge throughout July!

Thursday, July 16 | 5:30 PM - 7:30 PM | Community Boating Center (555 Harris Ave) | Register here | WIN Event Listing
Join the Disability Employee Resource Group on an outing to Adaptive Splash, an accessible community paddling session with the Community Boating Center, on Thursday, July 16 from 5:30 PM - 7:30 PM. There is a car/vanpool option available if registered in advance.

Wednesday, July 29 | 3:30 PM - 5:00 PM | Viking Union (MCC MUR) or Zoom | WIN Event Listing
Join the Neurodiversity Inclusion Collaborative for our July meeting on Wednesday, July 29 from 3:30 PM - 5:00 PM in Viking Union 735 (Multicultural Center Multi-Use Room) and over Zoom. 

View the Disability Pride Month book display at the Western Libraries throughout July! Learn more about the selection of items in the collections that give voice to the many disability communities here.

Showcase your disability pride by participate in the Disability Pride Month social media campaign! 

Ways To Participate:

  • Film a video answering one or more of the prompts. The Disability Pride Month Planning Committee will create a video with captions and a video description. 
  • Record audio answering one or more of the prompts. The Disability Pride Month Planning Committee will either create a video with captions or create a post with the transcript from your audio recording.
  • Provide a written quote answering one or more of the prompts and your first name as well as any additional information you'd like to share (role at WWU, year, major, minor). The Disability Pride Month Planning Committee will create a post with your quote.
  • Provide an anonymous written quote answering one or more of the prompts. The Disability Pride Month Planning Committee will create a post with your quote.

Learn more on the response form!

Event Locations

Accessibility Information

AA/EO. These events are intended for all participants including those with apparent or non-apparent disabilities. For disability accommodation(s) (such as ASL interpretation or TypeWell transcription), please contact disability.outreach@wwu.edu. Advanced notice is appreciated and sometimes necessary to arrange for some accessibility needs.
  • Masks: Masks are strongly encouraged at our event. KN95 masks are available at the door and upon request. Help protect our community by wearing a mask.
    • Masking makes in-person gatherings accessible for many, especially those in our immunocompromised and immunodeficient communities. However, we know that masking is inaccessible for some in our community.
  • Air Purifiers: Indoor events will have an air purifier that has four-stage hospital-type filtration with a true HEPA filter.
  • Testing: Attendees are encouraged to test for COVID prior to coming to events, if possible. At indoor events, we will have a limited number of rapid COVID tests available upon request.
  • Illness Policy: If you are experiencing any symptoms of contagious illness such as cough, sore throat, fever, or nausea, we encourage you to please stay home and join us at another time as our community includes members who are immunocompromised or have immunodeficiencies.

Please refrain from wearing scented products such as perfume, cologne, and fragrant personal care products while at our events as they can trigger serious health issues for those with fragrance allergies and/or chemical sensitivities. For more information, please visit Accessible Spaces: A Fragrance-Free Toolkit.

Please refer to the Interactive Campus Map for information about the nearest accessible entrances, parking, restrooms, elevators, routes, and walkways. 

Co-Sponsors

Planning Committee

  • Nicole Green, student
  • Harley Stringham, Disability Outreach Center
  • Mariana Orozco, Disability Outreach Center
  • Oscar Hastings, Disability Outreach Center
  • Axel Cichocki, Disability Access Center & Disability Outreach Center
  • Sarah Kapostasy, Counseling and Wellness Center

Resources

Disability Pride Month is celebrated every July and is an “opportunity to honor the history, achievements, experiences, and struggles” of the disabled community (The Arc, 2024). This year marks the 35th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA), passed July 26, 1990, the landmark legislation that broke down barriers to access and inclusion in society (The Arc, 2024). 2025 also marks the 52nd anniversary of the 504 Sit-In and passage of Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act, the first federal civil rights protection for disabled people (Disability Rights Education & Defense Fund, 2024).

The Disability Pride Flag, designed by Ann Magill, a writer with cerebral palsy, is the symbol of the disability pride movement. The original Disability Pride Flag, which featured brightly colored zigzagging stripes over a black background, was created by Ann Magill in 2019. Ann Magill had “attended an event for the 20th anniversary of the ADA and was disappointed that it was confined to the basement and grounds of an independent living center — instead of out in public. The experience motivated her to create a Disability Pride Flag” (Columbia University, 2023). As she explained in an interview on The Accessible Stall podcast, "My first design idea was to make the stripes zigzag, to represent how disabled people have to maneuver around all the barriers we face. We have to go this way and then we have to go that way, and then we have to go this way and then we have to go that way. And that’s how we move through the world." However, it came to Ann Magill's attention that “when viewed on a phone or computer screen, the design was causing symptoms for individuals with visually triggered disabilities including seizure and migraine disorders” (Ballard, 2023). The redesigned version of the flag, created by Ann Magill in 2021 in collaboration with several people with visually triggered disabilities, softens the colors and made the stripes straight instead of zigzagging. The order of the stripes was also changed to accommodate people with red-green colorblindness (Magill, 2022). 

The visually safe Disability Pride Flag features a muted black background with a diagonal band from the top left to bottom right corner, made up of five parallel stripes in red, gold, white, blue, and green. Each element of the flag carries meaning for the disabled community:

  • Faded Black Background: Represents "the anger and mourning over the eugenics and the neglect that disabled people have to fight against,"
  • Six "Standard" Flag Colors: Represents that the disabled community “is pan-national, spanning borders between states and nations,”
  • Red Stripe: Represents physical disabilities,
  • Gold Stripe: Represents neurodivergence,
  • White Stripe: Represents non-apparent disabilities and undiagnosed disabilities,
  • Blue Stripe: Represents emotional and psychiatric disabilities,
  • Green Stripe: Represents sensory disabilities, including d/Deafness, blindness, lack of smell, lack of taste, audio processing disorder, and all other sensory disabilities (Magill, 2022).

Student Engagement

Student Support Services

Academics