11
Jul
2025

Genevieve Fitzgibbon Receives 2025 AAIDD Humanitarian Award

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Keystone Human Services is pleased to announce that Geneveive Fitzgibbon, Vice President of Global Programs and Advocacy, has been awarded the 2025 Humanitarian Award from the American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities (AAIDD) on behalf of KHS for work promoting human welfare and social reform. Geneveive has spent her career working to promote full community inclusion and access to human rights for people with disability.

As the Vice President of Global Programs and Advocacy, Genevieve leads the development and strengthening of critical partnerships and advocacy priorities to expand Keystone Human Services’ effectiveness, influence, and impact on a global scale. KHS partners with people with disability, families, governments, and other organizations and disability rights leaders to design and develop innovative, sustainable community-based services, end institutionalization, promote disability rights, and connect people with the resources they need to pursue their goals at home, school, work, and in the community. She also serves as the head of Keystone Human Services International, which encompasses our work in Moldova and India.

For over twenty years, Keystone Moldova has worked toward inclusion for people with disability in Moldova, beginning with a community center for vulnerable children in one village to now impacting over 30,000 people. Keystone Moldova has supported people to leave institutions and establish full lives within the community and has partnered with national and local governments to develop legal frameworks for sustainable community-based services.

The twenty years Diana Zgherea spent in an institution have shaped her into a strong advocate for disability rights, especially the right to live in the community. “I feel free now,” she said. “I’m seeing friends. I go to the grocery store, prepare food. I go for a walk.” She currently works in a school.

Most importantly, she directs her own life. “I’m my own guide,” she said. Diana has presented at conferences in Austria and the United States about disability rights, calling on governments, organizations, and leaders to end institutionalization and uphold the rights of people with disabilities.

In India, we are working to drive the disability inclusion movement forward, providing national training for direct support practitioners and education on inclusive practices to support people with disability to live fully and take on valued roles within the community. In addition, we have supported people with disability find and reunite with their families, guiding them to step into valued roles within the communities and families they belong to.

One area of KHS’s advocacy work has centered around addressing the ways people with disability are disproportionately affected by humanitarian crises and disasters and left out of relief and recovery efforts. KHS has advocated for disability-inclusive policies and frameworks and has supported refugees to access healthcare, accessible shelters and transportation, and other community supports.

Genevieve received the award on behalf of KHS during AAIDD’s Annual Meeting in June. AAIDD is a nonprofit organization working to promote policies, research, effective practices, and human rights for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities.