GCDD Honors Jacquelyn Daniel with 2025 Spirit of Kim Award

Jacquelyn Daniel, founder of ConnectAbility in Dahlonega is the 2025 Spirit of Kim Unsung Hero Award Winner! This award celebrates individuals who demonstrate selfless service to Georgia's intellectual and developmental disability (I/DD) community. The winner shows the same giving spirit as GCDD's late Office Manager Kim Person. Kim worked for the Council for 19 years and passed away suddenly in July 2023.

The award recognizes individuals who make an impact, often behind the scenes, to advance GCDD's mission of promoting social and policy changes for people with developmental disabilities and their families. Recipients demonstrate the qualities Kim Person herself embodied: selflessness, dedication, and an unwavering commitment to service.

The Georgia Council on Developmental Disabilities (GCDD) is driven by its Five Year Strategic Plan goals to improve services and supports for people with intellectual and other developmental disabilities (I/DD). The Council, charged with creating systems change for individuals with developmental disabilities and family members, will work through various advocacy and capacity building activities to build a more interdependent, self-sufficient, and integrated and included disability community across Georgia.

This project was supported, in part by grant number 2001GASCDD-03, from the U.S. Administration for Community Living, Department of Health and Human Services, Washington, D.C. 20201. Grantees undertaking projects with government sponsorship are encouraged to express freely their findings and conclusions. Points of view or opinions do not, therefore, necessarily represent official ACL policy.