The record behind the voice

Advocacy grounded in real life.

Rob Harris combines a systems background, parent experience, technical knowledge, and years of public service to help families and challenge systems to do better.

Areas of work

From one family’s fight for access to broader systems change.

Blindness, Braille and technology

Braille literacy, assistive technology, orientation and mobility, accessible STEM, the Expanded Core Curriculum, and the presumption of competence.

APH FamilyConnect parent advising
U.S. Department of Education product review
Family and professional education

Special education and IDEA

Helping families understand evaluations, IEPs, prior written notice, procedural safeguards, accessibility, and ambitious outcomes.

Colorado Department of Education Certified IEP Facilitator
Former President, Colorado Parents of Blind Children
Parent-to-parent guidance across multiple states

Federal advocacy: OSERS and the Advance IDEA Coalition

Medicaid, LTSS and HCBS

Connecting family experience to decisions about home- and community-based services, assessments, case management, paid family caregiving, and accountability.

HCPF System of Care Lived Experience Committee
Former RMHP Family Support Council co-chair
Public testimony and policy analysis

Youth leadership and transition

Building self-determination, interdependence, peer connection, employment readiness, independent travel, and full participation.

Young Visionaries parent advising
Transition and Expanded Core Curriculum advocacy
Support for family and youth leadership

Special education / Federal advocacy · January 2026

National IDEA advocacy — U.S. Department of Education / OSERS

Rob Harris participated as a Colorado parent advocate in the January 2026 U.S. Department of Education Office of Special Education and Rehabilitative Services (OSERS) listening session on special education and vocational rehabilitation.

His comments on accountability under the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), state-to-state inconsistency, and the burden placed on families were featured in the Advance IDEA Coalition’s national response. The response was published and amplified across national disability and special-education organizations. The coalition includes the Council of Parent Attorneys and Advocates (COPAA), Council for Exceptional Children (CEC), National Center for Learning Disabilities (NCLD), The Arc of the United States, and the Center for Learner Equity.

Rob’s remarks connected federal oversight to what families experience: uneven access to services, the expectation that parents master complex systems, and the burden that falls on families when those systems fail—especially for students with low-incidence disabilities such as blindness.

“Families are not asking for perfection—we are asking for predictability, clarity, and accountability.”
Rob Harris · OSERS listening session, January 2026

Read the Advance IDEA Coalition response on COPAA

Selected roles

Invited into the rooms where systems are shaped.

Colorado Department of Education Certified IEP Facilitator
APH FamilyConnect Parent Advisor
U.S. Department of Education Product Review Panel member
HCPF System of Care Lived Experience Committee member
NRTC/NTAC Vocational Rehabilitation Community of Practice participant
Diabetes Counts Network board member
Orchard Mesa Lions Club board member and marketing chair

The method

Stories identify the harm. Evidence shows the pattern. Action changes the outcome.

Rob approaches advocacy like a systems problem: understand the rule, document what happened, identify the gap between policy and practice, ask direct questions, and keep the person affected at the center.

The goal is never attention for its own sake. The goal is a path that works better for the next family.