Sharing the Experience with Jack Robinson 51 Years of Advocacy in I/DD
Pioneers of Advocacy
Fifty-one years is long enough to see systems change, language change, rules change, and communities change. It is also long enough to understand what does not change: people want to be heard, respected, and supported in building a life that feels like their own.
That steady truth has guided Jack Robinson throughout more than five decades of service in the intellectual and developmental disabilities field. As Compliance Officer with Horizons of Tuscarawas and Carroll Counties, Inc., Jack has spent his career helping people, families, providers, and professionals understand both the human side and the regulatory side of support.
Even after retirement, he continues to advocate, train, and help others navigate a field that keeps evolving.
This interview profile, part of the Pioneers of Advocacy series, reflects on Jack’s long career, the changes he has witnessed, and the responsibility that comes with passing experience on to the next generation.
A career built on staying with the work
Jack Robinson’s career in the I/DD field did not unfold over a few short chapters. It spans more than half a century.
Over those 51 years, the field moved through major shifts in philosophy, service delivery, expectations, terminology, and law. Supports that once centered mainly on placement and care grew into a broader commitment to rights, choice, community membership, and person-centered planning.
For Jack, the work has always required more than knowing rules. It has required listening carefully, paying attention to the people affected by those rules, and helping others understand why compliance matters.
Compliance can sound like paperwork. In practice, it touches daily life.
It influences whether a person’s plan reflects their goals. It affects how staff are trained. It shapes how services respond when needs change. It protects health, safety, rights, privacy, and dignity. When done well, compliance does not sit apart from advocacy. It supports it.
Jack’s long service shows how closely those two ideas are connected.
Good advocacy is not only speaking up. It is knowing the system well enough to help people move through it without losing sight of who they are.
The interview
The following conversation explores Jack’s reflections on advocacy, training, compliance, and the changes he has seen across the I/DD field.
1.Tell me how you came to work in the DD field?
The year was 1974 and I had graduated from High School. I was uncertain what I wanted to do, but knew I didn’t want to work in a factory. My mom told me about my dads cousin that worked at Apple Creek Developmental Center so I applied there and was hired in the Dietary Department. I had graduated from the Wayne County Vocational School in the Food Service Department.
2. What type of job were you looking for when you came to work with individuals with developmental disabilities?
Anything in the Food Service industry.
3. If a job in developmental disabilities was not what you were looking for, what changed that made you want to stay in the field?
I had met a girl that I was head over heels in love with and she would eventually become my wife. (We just celebrated 49 years of being married 09-03-2026). Her mother worked at The Gruter Foundation which was an ICF/MR at that time. I was interested in possibly working there with her and she said she would put a word in for me to be hired. I started there and was there 12 years until the facility closed down. I had been promoted to supervisor, and did the hiring, firing, scheduling of staff for 3 out of 6 of the buildings. I found out very quickly that this was the career for me. I wanted to make a difference in peoples lives and make their living conditions better!
4. If you could describe yourself to others in the field, what would you tell them?
I love all people of all backgrounds and colors, and nationalities. I have never met a stranger, I look for the good in everyone I meet. I have a lot of empathy for people.
5. How long have you worked in this field and do you ever wish that you had done something else?
I have been doing this work 51 years. I have done other jobs in-between working with people with intellectual and developmental disabilities but always came back because I love working with people with disabilities! This type of work got in my blood and I can make a difference. Soon it will be 7 years that I retired, and was retired for 6 months and called my former Executive Director and asked if I could return to work! I love working at Horizons of Tuscarawas and Carroll Counties, Inc. My family asked me last year what I wanted for Christmas and I said “I want to keep working at what I do!” This is not just a job but I look at it as a “calling” in my life to make a difference, we can change the world if we try! This is a song by Lanny Wolfe. Together we can make a difference, we can change the world if we try! I want to be a part of changing somebody’s world!
6. What is the best piece of advice that you would give someone starting in the field that has never worked in it before?
Don’t judge this field by something you’ve heard before or you have been told! Try this work out for yourself! Give it 90 days or a year. Keep talking to your employer if you have questions, and don’t just quit or not show up! Do you know how many people just drop out of these peoples lives?
7. What are the biggest challenge that providers and professionals face in the field, in your opinion?
The lack of staff. Plus trying to stay in business. There’s always changes to the Rules! Change is good sometimes. Sometimes people change the rules and they have never done the work to know what changes need to happen. If its not broken it’s better to leave it alone. In my opinion.
8. Among the challenges that professionals and providers face, what motivates you to keep moving forward?
The individuals need us! That is why we are here! They rely on us to keep them safe! I love a challenge! This is what keeps me going as a professional!
9. Can you share a personal experience that influences you now in the work you do?
There was an individual who was sick and went to a doctor and the doctor ran tests, the doctor said the individual was in failure to thrive and to make him comfortable. This individual loved going to church and loved helping the teacher. He looked forward to getting Subway cookies every Friday evening. He became weaker, it didn’t make sense what the doctor said about the Failure to Thrive. I had the Home manager call the Squad to take him to the Emergency Room the ER physician ran the same tests over and found a condition that needed immediate surgery! This individual lived a Happy life for several years after this incident. I had a gut feeling that the first doctor was incorrect in his diagnosis!
Follow your gut feeling. It helps sometimes to get a second opinion from another physician! Listen to what the individual is telling you. We are their advocates! We know our individuals better than anyone else and our observations matter and we need to be heard in their best interest. I would rather question something a doctor has said and get a second opinion, than to walk in a funeral home and say to the family I am so sorry for your loss, I wish I would have questioned the doctor and had got another opinion!!!!!
10. What do you look for in a Direct Service Professional when hiring?
Someone with empathy, kind and compassionate. I look for someone that I would want to provide care for my loved ones!
11. What would be your recommendation for a Direct Support Professional to build their tools for successful, safe and satisfying careers in the DD field?
Get hired by an agency. Bigger is not always better. Learn all you can about this field. There are certifications that you must keep up to date like CPR/AED/ First Aid, Non Violent Crises Intervention, and they must not expire! Know when you must renew your trainings! Be Proactive in your career! You will go far! Study MUI/UI Training, don’t hesitate to fill out the MUI/UI Forms. When in doubt Fill It Out, Stick to the facts, and only the facts! Fill it out as though a jury will be reading it! Because someday a jury may need to read it!
12. What do you hope to see in the DD field moving forward?
Networking with each other and with County Boards and SSA’s, we are all in this field together! There is power in numbers and if we are to survive in making things better we need to be a team and work together! If I can be a help to another provider I will do what I can for them. What goes around, comes around!
I would like to see Provider Meetings every month put on by the local county board of DD. More trainings for staff and recognition for the Direct Support Professionals.
Advocacy must include the people doing direct support
Direct support professionals carry much of the daily responsibility in the I/DD field. They are often the ones who know a person’s routines, communication style, preferences, and early signs that something may be wrong.
Good advocacy includes them. Not just labeling them "professionals" but treating them with professional respect. Respect is the number one thing that a DSP states is the reason for leaving a provider agency. Just because you have some that are not caring or are not a good fit, you cannot stop being professional to the DSP. With mentoring and psychological safety in the workplace, great staff can develop.
Jack’s training work recognizes that staff need more than instructions. They need context. They need to know what to do, why it matters, and when to ask for help. They also need respect for the skill their role requires.
A well-trained staff member can make a person feel safe, heard, and valued. A poorly supported staff member may miss important details or struggle when situations become complex.
That is why training remains central to Jack’s work after retirement. The field depends on people who can translate policy into practice.
Why experience matters in a changing system
Some knowledge can be found in manuals. Some can only be built through years of service.
Jack Robinson’s experience gives him both.
He has seen how decisions made at the policy level affect people at home, at work, in transportation, in medical appointments, and in community settings. He has worked through changing expectations and helped others adjust to them. He understands that strong systems require both compassion and accountability.
That balance is not always easy.
Too much focus on process can make services feel cold. Too little focus on standards can leave people unprotected. The best work holds both together.
People deserve dignity, choice, and safety. Organizations need clear practices that make those values real.
Jack’s long career shows why the field needs mentors, trainers, and advocates who can connect those ideas.
Sharing experience is its own form of advocacy
After 51 years, continuing to train and guide others is more than a professional habit. It is a way to protect the future of the field.
New professionals need experienced voices. They need people who can explain not only what changed, but why it changed. They need context for current expectations. They need examples of what respectful support looks like in daily life.
That does not mean the next generation should simply copy the past. The field must keep growing. People receiving services should continue to shape that growth. Self-advocacy must remain central.
But history helps. It can warn against repeating mistakes. It can show which values have endured. It can remind people that progress took work and still requires work.
Jack’s continuing service reflects a generous kind of leadership. He is not holding experience back. He is sharing it.
What newer professionals can learn from Jack’s example
The details of I/DD services vary by state, role, and organization, but several lessons from Jack’s career apply broadly.
Treat training as ongoing, not one-time (Care Cultivation *wink)
The field changes too often for training to be treated as a box to check once.
Staff need refreshers. Teams need space to talk through real situations. Leaders need to revisit assumptions. People receiving services and families need clear information when processes change.
Ongoing training creates a safer and more consistent environment. It also builds confidence among staff.
This is the philosophy of Care Cultivation. What is taught in the classes the DSP participates in, is only scratching the surface. That knowledge is the seed that is planted and it needs adequate cultivation to grow and be grounded firmly.
A legacy measured in people supported
A 51-year career cannot be measured only in job titles or years served. It is measured in the people who were better understood, the families who found guidance, the staff who learned to support with more care, and the organizations that became more accountable.
Jack Robinson’s story is a reminder that advocacy takes many forms.
Sometimes it is public and visible. Sometimes it happens in training rooms, policy reviews, service plans, and careful conversations. Sometimes it means helping someone understand a rule that seemed impossible to follow. Sometimes it means asking whether the person at the center of the plan has truly been heard.
Through his work with Horizons of Tuscarawas and Carroll Counties, Inc., and through his continued commitment after retirement, Jack remains part of the field’s ongoing progress.
The next generation of I/DD professionals will face challenges Jack could not have predicted when his career began. They will also inherit lessons that still hold true: listen first, learn the rules, respect the person, train well, and never let compliance become separate from dignity.
That is the value of sharing the experience. It turns one career of service into guidance for many more.
To become involved in the Pioneers of Advocacy, and share your experience-Please reach out to Charity Draman RN at Care Cultivation: charityd@carecultivation-s.com
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