Move to Include's History

Move to Include spotlights people of differing abilities and disability issues - including education, healthcare, housing, recreation, employment and local efforts to support inclusion - through television, radio, news, special events, and social media. The initiative works to inspire and motivate people to embrace different abilities and include all people in all aspects of community life.

Move to Include was launched in 2014 as a partnership between WXXI Public Media in Rochester, NY and the Golisano Foundation, the nation’s largest private foundation devoted to supporting programs for people with intellectual, developmental, and physical disabilities. The Foundation has provided more than $1 million in funding to date for Move to Include. The Corporation for Public Broadcasting recognizes the importance of diversity and inclusion, as well as the value of expanding locally-developed community-based models of content and engagement. CPB funded the expansion of Move to Include to five additional public media stations in 2019 in a one-year pilot. To learn more about the national initiative, visit MovetoInclude.us. 

WXXI Public Media has been providing focused coverage of disabilities for the past 15 years, first partnering in 2005 with the Al Sigl Community of Agencies to produce Dialogue on Disability, a one-week initiative weaving programming and news coverage focused on disabilities. In the first year, Dialogue on Disability reached 30,000 people. In 2014 with the support of businessman and philanthropist Tom Golisano and the Golisano Foundation, the year-round Move to Include initiative was formed, enabling WXXI to develop year-round programming promoting inclusion that now reaches more than one million people. WXXI has continued to expand production, increase the number of special events, and widen its reach online and on social with the support of $1 million to date from the Golisano Foundation, the nation’s largest private foundation devoted to supporting programs for people with intellectual, developmental, and physical disabilities.

Watch this short video about the national initiative: