Meet Our Advisory Counsel
The advisory Council is a group of individuals who lend their expertise on a voluntary basis. They are subject matter experts, influencers, or leaders in their field who believe in our organization and it’s mission.
Elizabeth Organt
Elizabeth Organt graduated from the University of Baltimore with a B.A. in history and an M.S. in education from Niagara University. She has 28 years of experience teaching and advising students with diagnosed learning disabilities. She, also, served as Department Chair, Mentor and Senior Project Advisor. She has presented at numerous conferences, mainly with The Learning Disabilities Association of America. Currently, she is serving on the Adult Transition to College, Trade School or Career Committee for Learning Disabilities of Pennsylvania. She currently lives in the suburban Philadelphia area with her husband and enjoys spending time traveling.
Gary C. Norman, Esq. L.L.M.
Mr. Norman is a dedicated public servant gifted with the ability to bring people of seemingly unrelated interests together. He personally and professionally knows the challenges in forging a unique career in spite of bias and barriers. He currently serves as the Chair of the Maryland Commission on Civil Rights. He has the unique brand of serving the public with a special sidekick, guide dog Bowie.
His public policy dialogue work shows his orientation towards non-partisan collaboration, convening experts together. In 2020, he received the Administrator’s Award at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services for his work on healthcare accessibility and quality policy related to people with disabilities. In November 2019, he served as a Fellow at the invite-only Public Policy Conflict Resolution Fellowship. A program for high-level leaders convened under the auspices of the Md. judiciary. He serves on the Maryland Lynching Truth and Reconciliation Commission. In 2015, he served as a Visiting Fellow at the non-partisan Robert J. Dole Institute for Politics. He established a multi-year non-partisan symposium on animal law and policy brokering regional or even national experts together. He is known for his semi-regular salons in which he brokers thought leaders, including, the disabled and the able, having mentored a range of law students with disabilities.
Mr. Norman believes that action on the public square must be matched with scholarship and reflection. He is the past founder and Co-Executive Editor of The Mid-Atlantic Journal on Law and Public Policy: Animal and Disability Reporter, a non-partisan, law and public policy journal on animal and disability issues. He has a column in the Maryland Daily Record focusing on policy and on his adventures to influence policy as a lawyer with a guide dog.
Mr. Norman started his public service career as a Presidential Management Fellow in 2000 with the federal government after graduating from Wright State University and Cleveland State University. He serves as pro bono legal counsel to the Board of Directors of the Presidential Management Alumni Association. In 2011, he obtained his Masters in Letters of Law at the Program on Law and Government at the Washington College of Law at American University, focusing on healthcare regulation as well as healthcare policy and non-discrimination. He has served as a policy briefer on disability and non-discrimination at a global health conference on gender and human rights. In 2008, he traveled to the European Union as an American Marshall Memorial Fellow.
Mr. Norman enjoys the theatre, writing, and sharing time reading his books whilst drinking coffee. His dog or dogs are usually near-by chewing on a bone or playing with toys.