Press Release: 2024-05-06

Our Advocacy Network in Action: Evelyn Disla

 

May 3, 2024

“When I had my first son, he was going to daycare, and we were paying privately. Then when I had my second son, I couldn’t afford to pay for both of them,” Evelyn Disla recalls. “So I quit my job.” 

Staying at home with two young children was rewarding and just challenging enough that Evelyn wanted to return to work.

A friend who worked at Child Care Circuit — a nonprofit organization in Lawrence, Mass., that provides child care referrals, training, and parent and provider services — encouraged Evelyn to join her.

Evelyn’s husband said, “Please make sure your salary at least covers the cost of child care.”

And Evelyn became a voucher counselor, helping families navigate the process of applying for child care subsidy vouchers.

“I started working,” she says, “and I found that I liked the job. That’s how it started and then my little one was diagnosed with autism. That’s when I really started appreciating child care because since he was diagnosed, he has had challenges. And child care providers wouldn’t take him. They were just turning me away.”

Evelyn’s job and her experience as a mom pushed her into the work of standing up for families. Today, she is also a member of Strategies for Children’s Advocacy Network.

“I was one of those parents that thought child care providers just change diapers and feed your children — until I really understood what they were doing.”

A family child care provider changed Evelyn’s life by agreeing to take care of her son, who began to learn to identify letters and colors.

Evelyn eventually moved her son to a child care center that worked with an organization that could provide early intervention services. Then she found herself bouncing from center to center, looking for the right fit, until she found a child care program at her local YMCA that both her sons could attend.

“They have a saying in my country that you can’t see what you don’t know. And I started seeing parents who were struggling in the same situation as I was.

“I could really connect to those parents who came to me because they needed to change child care providers because they were told their child’s behavior was bad. So I started connecting, and I began to see that there is no misbehaving child, there is only a child with a challenge.”

“Now I empathize more with families. I started putting aside families’ incomes and providers’ pay rates for a minute, and I connected with what families needed, and that’s when I started loving doing what I do.” 

Evelyn has become a power navigator, helping families manage paperwork and the timing of the testing they need to get services. She understands waiting lists and the array of services a child can get and how you cope as a parent while you’re waiting to get the diagnosis that will open the door to services. If she doesn’t know the answers to parents’ questions, she knows who knows, and she directs parents accordingly.

“That’s my biggest passion. I like to educate my clients. Since my son’s diagnosis, I have faced the reality of children with special needs. I’m a better person. I’m a different person because before my son’s diagnosis I didn’t have the empathy. I’ll tell you the truth: I was one of those people who would see a child misbehave and I would judge them.”

Before Evelyn joined the Advocacy Network, she saw herself as someone who was fighting for her child’s rights and for the rights of other children.

“Now ‘advocate’ is part of my vocabulary.”

And it’s part of her life. When Massachusetts Education Secretary Patrick Tutwiler spoke to the Advocacy Network, Evelyn took her time and told her personal story, and she explained what she thought Massachusetts should do for families like hers.

“He was very honest. The answer that he gave me was not the answer that I wanted. It wasn’t a specific action plan. But I felt he really listened to what I was saying. And he feels the same way that I feel. And he knows that there are a lot of people who need assistance with children with special needs.

As part of her Advocacy Network experience, Evelyn is helping to find someone who can do a presentation in Spanish about how family child care providers can enroll in the state’s child care voucher program and help increase the number of child care slots for low-income families.

“The language barrier is huge,” she says. “And some providers, because they don’t speak English, think that they can’t access everything that is out there.”

Evelyn can feel herself changing as she advocates for families and for the early childhood workforce. She is, she says, gaining more tools and learning about more resources.

“I knew a little, but now I know a lot more, and I’m going to keep learning. I’m connecting with policymakers. I’m connecting with other agencies that work with parents and Children. I’m learning about other Advocacy Network members; I’m learning what they do and how they do it. I am in a network with family child care providers who tell me about their curriculum and what they do.

“That’s my biggest takeaway, knowledge.” 

And, of course, sharing that knowledge with everyone who needs it.