Christy soon realized that teaching the disabled to read and write was not enough to change their situation in society. Her students needed decent housing and the opportunity for full-time education and vocational skills training in order to have a chance to create their own employment. In 1997, Christy approached the Lagos state government with a request for a set of dilapidated buildings. Her request granted, she began to renovate the buildings, making them into an all-inclusive center with training facilities and hostel accommodations. Students who show a desire to further their education and become economically self-sufficient are sponsored by Christy's organization. In addition to basic education, Christy's center offers vocational training in shoe making, metal work and fabrication, tailoring and fashion design, poultry production, and carving. Vitally important to Christy's approach, the center's trainers also teach the disabled to become trainers themselves. Products made at the center are sold to generate revenue for the center and provide an income for the disabled producers.To aid educated students in obtaining employment, Christy successfully lobbies various state governments to hire the disabled people. She also seeks out contract work for the center, both within and without Nigeria, which provides employment for

graduated and resident students. Even with opportunities for employment, Christy knows that for disabled people to really live a fulfilling life, the social stigma associated with their condition needs to be removed, and legal protection for their rights enforced. She thus started a campaign with a leading human rights organization (Civil Liberties Organization) to draft and present a disabilities bill to the national legislature. She hopes that this bill will help protect the disabled from discriminations they face in employment and other arenas. In addition to her legislative initiatives, Christy is intensifying various public campaigns to reduce the stigma attached to the disabled. Christy is now focused on expanding the services provided in her model center and on creating branches of the center in other places. During the past year, for example, she has incorporated computer training into the Lagos center curriculum. And she is spreading her model by setting up a branch of her learning center in a rural community in Imo state.