Renowned Disability Policy Expert To Join Kay Center As Visiting Scholar

Published on Friday, August 24, 2007

Claremont Graduate University is pleased to announce the appointment of Susan M. Daniels, Ph.D. to the position of Visiting Scholar at The Kay Center for E-Health Research in the School of Information Systems and Technology. She began on July 1.

Daniels brings to the Kay Center over 25 years of highly successful executive experience in leading federal agencies, academic institutions, and philanthropic organizations through development, change and innovation. She is skilled at combining academic knowledge, practical experience and constituency-based concerns into policies and program solutions.

“I have been very impressed with the dedication that the Kay Center has had toward bringing the advantages of the internet to the disability space,” Daniels said. “I am looking very forward to working with Tom and his team toward identifying some tangible policy recommendations for improving e-health in the disability community.”

While at the Kay Center, Daniels will be leading research and policy analysis on how e-heath systems could benefit the millions of Americans that have some form of disability. Thomas Horan, Kay Center Director notes that, “We are thrilled to have someone of Dr. Daniels’s caliber lead our Washington, DC efforts to raise the awareness of policy makers regarding the disability potential of electronic and personal health systems.”

Steeve Kay, founder of the Kay Center concurs, “I have been an admirer of Dr. Daniels’s policy and political skills for the last 20 years and look forward to her insights as to how we can impact disability policies and systems.”
Daniels served as Deputy Commissioner for Disability and Income Security Programs where she was responsible for directing the policy and programs of the Social Security Administration (SSA) with an administrative budget of more than $2 billion and over 18,000 employees.

Daniels received her Doctorate in Philosophy from the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill where her dissertation was titled Correlates of Attitudes Toward the Sexuality of Disabled Persons in the Health Professions. Her professional and community service contributions are numerous including Honorary Doctorate in Public Administration from University of Illinois. She has been recognized as one of the Outstanding Women in Government by the Ford Foundation, inducted into the National Hall of Fame for People with Disabilities, and was the Chair of the President's Committee on Employment of Persons with Disabilities in Washington, DC.