Kerry Thompson

Senior Advisor, Inclusion & Accessibility

Kerry Thompson is the Inclusion & Accessibility Development Manager for the Disability Rights Fund and the Disability Rights Advocacy Fund. In this role, Kerry develops the accessibility policies and practices of DRF/DRAF for internal stakeholders and grantees and leads efforts to demonstrate and promote to donors and others how accessibility is key to inclusion, using DRF/DRAF policies and practices as a model.

Kerry brings more than twenty years of combined experience in accessibility, analytics, business, communications, finance, and grants management for the academic, healthcare, and nonprofit secotrs, including working for Brigham and Women’s Hospital and the National Institute of Health. She is an active advocate for the disability community with an emphasis on making the arts and healthcare more accessible. Her academic experience included human rights courses at Harvard’s Kennedy School of Government and Harvard Law School. She is a 2014 Marshall Memorial Fellow with the German Marshall Fund for the United States. She serves as the Executive Director for Silent Rhythms Inc., a non-profit that promotes access to the arts and in society for people with disabilities. She was named a 2020 Visiting Artist to Harvard University’s Dance Center. Kerry also serves as Commissioner on the Massachusetts Commission on the Status of Persons with Disabilities, Vice-Chair on the Massachusetts Statewide Advisory Council and on the New England Foundations for the Arts (NEFA) Advisory Council. She previously served on the board of directors for DEAF, Inc. and board liaison for DeafBlind Community Access Network.

Kerry holds a Master’s in Human Development and Psychology from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Education with an academic focus on disability rights in the broader context of international human rights.

Read Kerry’s reflection about living with DeafBlindness and her passion for working at DRF/DRAF