Perseverance in Profile
MICHELLE DUPREY: ADVOCATE FOR THE
DISABLED A Profile of Courage BY TOM CALARCO
10
You would be hard pressed to find a better advocate for those with disabilities than Michelle Duprey, director of the Department of Services for Persons with Disabilities for the city of New Haven, Conn. The attorney, born with Osteogenesis Imperfecta, a bone disorder that causes fractures and inhibits growth, has been serving the city since 1998, and her work has been recognized with numerous awards.
She’s a classic example of the cliché “good things come in small packages,” for she stands only three feet tall. Nevertheless, she does not require a personal assistant, gets around with a wheelchair and scooter (though she can walk short distances), and has had her driver’s license since 1989.
t was a little bumpy for me during my early years in school,” Duprey says. “It was the early 1970s and we (those with disabilities) were often segregated and treated differently.” Fortunately, her family moved to Avon, Conn.,
when she was in fifth grade where she was fully mainstreamed. “I was given every opportunity to participate in
activities that I had been discouraged from,” she says. In high school, she joined the school newspaper,
was a member of student government, and managed the track, soccer and swim teams. “For the most part, my peers were good to me,” she says. Her family, however, did not coddle her. “My family had high expectations for me,” she
says. “As a kid I tried to milk my disability but they would have none of that, and they challenged me to pick myself up. It clearly was the best strategy because it forced me to stretch myself.” Duprey had little idea what she wanted to do with her
life at that time. “I had thought about being a paralegal,” she says. “But
this was the early 1980s and the profession was not very welcoming to those with disabilities. I also had thought about architecture.” She eventually enrolled at Bryant College in Providence,
R.I., in part because her mother wanted her to be close to home, and chose to study economics and marketing. Her
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