Fun at the Cafe

17 years ago, a group of people in Florida began the tradition of an annual conference. The first and second were day long events held each in a different part of the state. The idea was to bring people with disabilities and their families together for an informational and uplifting experience, meeting venders, having an opportunity to speak to service providers and just being able to pick the brains of educators, legislators and professionals who had much to share.

As the years past, The Florida Family Cafe grew into this enormous 3 day event, always held in Orlando which has many conereence center hotels and is in pretty much the easiest part of the state to get to. The event itself is always free to the attendees with hotel accommodations provided at a group discounted rate, making it affordable to most of the community. It has grown now with 9-15 thousand people going through the event in the 3 days.

The conference is always on the first weekend in June. We just returned from this year's event. Most years we have a governor's summit to start off, but this year Florida was in emergency session and our legislatures were unable to attend. We did, however, see videotaped addresses and were able to have questions and answers by a panel of highly ranked administrators. We had many issues covered, from IEP's to Transitioning into the workforce. Adaptive sports (including archery), equipment, therapies, and ADA representative, Disability attorneys, lawyers and financial advisers and so much more were present. You can see this year's program for more details on what is in included.

There is time for fun as well. The children can be left in a special daycare setting while the parents attend important workshops. On Saturday there is a dance with a DJ, food and time to kick back and meet and greet new and old friends. The pool was awesome and there was time to go for a swim. The hotels are always chosen to give everyone the best possible adventure while gaining incredibly worthwhile info. It is worth attending if you are a resident of Florida and in the area and. If you are not local, it would be great to encourage some organizations or the government to begin something like this in your area. If you would like to find out more about it contact:

Florida Family Cafe
519 N. Gadsden St.
Tallahassee, FL 32301