Title:
Disability Pride, Digital Accessibility & the Power of “Why Not Me?” with Jessica Lopez

Subtitle:
Alycia Anderson sits down with Jessica Lopez to explore accessible education, disability advocacy, SEO, inclusive hiring, and corporate accessibility.

Transcript:

Alycia Anderson: Welcome to Pushing Forward with Alycia, a podcast that gives disability a voice. Each week, we will explore topics like confidence, ambition, resilience, and finding success against all odds. We are creating a collective community that believes that all things are possible for all people. Open hearts, clear paths, let’s go

Welcome back to Pushing Forward with Alycia. I’m Alycia Anderson. Today’s guest is the kind of woman makes you sit up a little straighter, dream a little bigger, rethink what leadership, access, and ambition really can look like. Jessica Lopez is a marketing and strategy consultant whose career has crossed B2B tech, the public sector nonprofit, legal industries, and beyond.

She’s partnered and touched about 300 organizations in the work that she’s doing. Impressive. I was at 200, and you’re at 300, so good job, girl. she helps organizations with their digital brand strategy, brand positioning, and how to show up with purpose and impact. She has held roles at Amazon, OpenSesame, the US Department of Labor, and Jessica’s story has reached far beyond her impressive resume. She was born without hands and feet. We wanna hear all about your lived experience, of course, whatever you’re comfortable with. And, she’s been navigating so many different systems her entire life and making space for herself. She is one of the most incredible advocates that I’ve had the privilege and pleasure of getting to know. She is an Obama-Chesky Voyager scholar. She has social impact wrapped in all of her initiatives and the work that she’s doing. She’s absolutely incredible. She’s a powerhouse. She just graduated from Arizona State University. The world and career path is her oyster.

I can’t wait to see what she does. Welcome to the show. I’m so excited that you’re gonna share your story with us.

Jessica Lopez: Thank you. Thank you so much for inviting me. It’s been really awesome to see the leadership that you’ve done over the last couple of years and I definitely wanna model some of my career, some of my work after some of the stuff that you’ve done as well. So excited to join you.

Alycia Anderson: You know how much that means to me. If I could leave any little motivation for the amazing women that are coming up behind me that are gonna take the lead and so powerfully lead further than I ever have gone that really means a lot to me, so I appreciate you saying that. Your resume is extremely powerful. I think you and I first connected on LinkedIn admiring one another, and you’ve worked on some of the most forward-facing initiatives in disability advocacy and beyond, and all of that is powerful, and we’re gonna get into it. But I want to start with the human behind all the headlines and the accomplishments, if that’s okay with you.

Jessica Lopez: Of course.

Alycia Anderson: So my first question to you is, who is Jessica Lopez? When you’re not consulting, when you’re not speaking, when you’re not writing policy and changing systems and advocating for all of us, who are you out in this world?

Jessica Lopez: Oh, I love that question. One of the favorite things that I love to tell people, a fun fact about me is that when I was a teenager, I actually used to ride horses. So I am a massive horse lover. I used to go horseback riding every week for probably about five years when I could afford it.

It’s my dream to own like a horse ranch and just live in, horse country for the rest of my life. But that’s a big part of my identity. A couple of months ago, I went to see the horse races, which I absolutely loved. That’s a fun fact about me, and I think people are always shocked with that just because it’s like I don’t have feet.

So people are always wondering “How are you able to ride horses?” and those kind of things. But I think that kind of shows the spirit of who I am which is that I like to try new things. I like to travel. I like to experience the world and push myself to my limit, both like physically as much as I can, even with a chronic illness, but also mentally as well.

So that’s just a fun fact about me. I also really enjoy movies. I feel like I’ve watched every movie out there. So I’m a definitely a big movie fan as well. Yeah, that’s a little bit about me outside of the headlines. But I also bring all of that creativity in the work that I do, both professionally and, pushing the boundaries of both myself but also the people that I work with as well.

Alycia Anderson: So I love that, pushing boundaries, number one. And I love that you brought up the horse riding because that’s like something on my bucket list that, I’ve been a little bit afraid to show up and go try because my hips are tight, my legs are this, will it work? There’s all these like self-doubts that I put in front of me, but I do feel like…

And tell me if this is true. I feel like getting on a horse, especially if you could take it, and tell me if you’ve done this, take a horse like hiking in a mountain or up like some space that would be really difficult as a wheelchair user, frankly, that you probably couldn’t get to.

Jessica Lopez: Yeah.

Alycia Anderson: That is the closest to… And I don’t wanna say like I need to feel like it, how it feels to walk once in my life, but it feels like it would be the closest to like having a stride and getting to somewhere without my wheelchair independently that’s like adventurous. Is that true at all?

Jessica Lopez: 100%. Yeah, and I think like horses, just horseback riding is freedom in a way that nothing else can give you. And like wheelchairs are also freedom, but horses, you can, gallop with them. You can, cross, so many stretches of miles that you can never cross with a wheelchair.

Especially like me, I use a power wheelchair. I can only go five miles per hour, which is like impossibly slow for me. So to be able to go as fast as I want on a horse, there’s there’s nothing like it. I 100% recommend it. And once you try it once, it just feels natural and you get used to it, and it just comes easier for you.

So I always tell people, “Please ride a horse at least once in your life. You’re gonna fall in love with it. There’s nothing like it in the world.”

Alycia Anderson: I wanna come down to San Diego and do that with you. Do you do that in adaptive place or are you just… Yes?

Jessica Lopez: It was in adaptive place. It was in San Diego County, not too far from where I live, and they did a little adaptation to make sure I can control the reins but also kick the horse and make sure it can go. But to do like verbal command as well, at least with the horse that I rode, which was trained in that.

And then of course, talking to it and all of those cues that can really help people who can’t necessarily kick or do things like that. So there’s a lot of ways to adapt to it and do it in your own way and in a way that is like at your pace. So 100%.

Alycia Anderson: Amazing. Like list for me. So I love that you just brought that up. And good for you that turns out to be like one of your top passions to push the boundaries.

Jessica Lopez: 100%. It’s– Yeah, there’s nothing… I think anybody that like feels like there’s a limitation on their body it can really help you get outside of your body in that way because you’re really relying on the trust of the horse.

Alycia Anderson: That’s so cool. okay, so you mentioned riding the horse. You were born without hands and feet. So whatever you’re comfortable with, like I love for you to share your unique, beautiful life. Do you mind?

Jessica Lopez: I’ll tell you

Alycia Anderson: we were both congenital, so I like that we have this in common that we as we’re navigating growing up and as women and little girls and all that, tell us, take us back a little bit.

Jessica Lopez: Absolutely. So I was born without hands and feet. I was also born with hard of hearing, so I use hearing aids. So when I was younger hearing aids were very taboo. And so at the time the only thing that you could really have was those FM boxes. So it would be like a box maybe probably about three inches wide, and it was a square, and it would use radio to connect to hearing aids.

So it would hang around my neck, bumped around my body. It was very obviously connected. And then the box would have a tube that would connect to my hearing aids. So that was like– It made me obviously I had to wrap around both living with hearing loss, but also living with a physical disability of being born without hands and feet.

But I went to a performing arts school in K through 12. So in elementary school, I did singing, dancing and drama. In elementary school, I would do performances every year. I would dance. I absolutely loved being on stage and dancing, and I think that really helped me come into my own and become somebody that’s both comfortable with being on stage, comfortable with having those conversations but also putting yourself out there.

And I think the best thing that I could have done for myself that my mom could have done for me was, putting me in performing arts because that really helped me be more confident in who I am and speaking up for myself and doing keynotes and all of the other things that came with it.

I think one of the biggest things as well, and that really helped me build my intelligence, I really think music really helped kids develop. So I always had a lot of fun being in or performing at school. I was also a straight A student. I was really in a gifted program, so I did a lot of studying.

I absolutely love learning. I still do. So I just learned to do things as I went. And so one of the stories that I always like to tell people is that you might not realize it, but for example I was born without my arms, so my arms stop at my elbows. But I actually used to play Barbies all the time.

So I would take off the dresses and put on the clothes and put on the shoes. And Barbies are very small. If you’re a girl and you’re listening, you know how hard it is to dress and undress Barbies. And that was something that I could do 100%. And I always told my family they would go to try to help me, and I would– The first thing I would say is “No, I do it.”

I could barely talk. I’m, like, one years old, and I’m just like, “I do it.” That’s just who I am as a person. And so ever since then, I’ve just, really challenging myself or pushing myself in the best way that I can. And I think that has really helped me feel confident in going for things that I want and trying to strive and achieve the things that I hope to achieve, both to make things more accessible for the world, but also to help, myself and both in a career and a business standpoint as well.

Alycia Anderson: I love the Barbie story, you know what I mean? Like, no, no, no. I’m dressing her the way that I want, in the…

Jessica Lopez: Yes.

Alycia Anderson: …way that I want, and how I want. So no, I don’t need help. and those clothes are hard to get on honestly. Oh, that’s incredible. And just one question about the performing arts school, ’cause I think that’s amazing that your parents chose to put you in a performing arts school.

What did the students with disability population look like there if and this is such… I’m gonna just assume that it was small to none.

Jessica Lopez: There.

Alycia Anderson: Probably bad of me to say, but I believe that’s probably true. And how, if that is true, did you not only impact the education process there, but like from entry point to maybe even graduation, like how did that view you being integrated in performing arts and whatever, like how did that change?

And was there any like bias? I’m assuming there was, but you tell me.

Jessica Lopez: Yeah. It was actually really interesting. that wasn’t the school that I was going to go to. I was gonna go to a school that was closer to my neighborhood. But my mom saw that I really loved doing talent shows for them when I was, like, two years old.

And so I would be using the karaoke machine singing. And so my mom was like, “I need to get her into a performing arts school.” And so that’s exactly what she did. And it actually was like … It is a challenge just to get any student outside of their home school period, but then also the fact that it’s a performing arts school.

I, I use a wheelchair. I did prosthetics at the time. It was definitely interesting. But it actually was the result of the principal. He was a really great guy who was really open-minded to the fact of somebody like me coming to his school. And so it really ended up boiling down to his decision, and it just was the right person at the right time to say yes.

And so he was really excited to take me and bring me into the school. And they were really incredible about making sure that students knew who I was, knew why I was the way I was. So they would really raise awareness of the students, especially like the younger kids. So I didn’t really experience a lot of bullying in school because of my hands and feet.

Of course, I experienced, conflicts with my friends, but that was never as a result of my disability itself. And so I was really treated like a normal kid in my classes. And I know I’m very privileged in that way, and I think that boiled down to the school itself making sure to let students know “This is how treat her.

This is how you build a friendship with her. This is how you make sure that she’s the same as everybody else.” So that really made all the difference. But also in my confidence as well, because I didn’t really have that ableism from the students. But yeah. And they were really accommodating as well.

They provided me more than enough for all of the tools that I needed, the step stools and things that I needed to get things done. So it was a really good experience for the most part.

Alycia Anderson: That’s incredible. And I have the word written in front of me, confidence, because that word for me, and I only know you so well, like we’ve had a couple conversations, but like you exude confidence.

Jessica Lopez: Thank you.

Alycia Anderson: Yeah, so I literally have that word written down. So I love it that you brought that back to originating in school in this it sounds like a beautifully inclusive, integrative environment where if things weren’t like perfect for you, they were willing to work on it and bring the student community to rally around you and with you.

That’s so amazing.

Jessica Lopez: It was definitely challenging in other ways. There was a lot of challenges. It was wasn’t necessarily challenges with the accommodations. For example, the tools that I needed, I always got, for example accessible cutting tools. I could cut paper and draw and all of those things.

But I did have more challenges with, for example, I used an aide when I was in school. I would imagine a lot of students who are, like, born with disabilities like ours are used to having aides. There was a lot of times there was a lot of miscommunication between me and the aides, and that’s where things would really get extremely challenging.

Just because the aides wanna do things one way, but I knew how to do things in my own way. And there would be conflict in that way. But that was, I think, more of a personnel thing versus a willingness to accommodate me physically. So there can be different dynamics, I think, with those things as well.

Just making sure that the person that is assigned to a student is actually the right person for them. Because if they are not then, the school should be willing to adapt and, find the right person for them, especially when it comes to somebody with a very rare disability like ours.

Alycia Anderson: I love that you mentioned that too. I wonder how many schools are, like, cognizant of that, of you know what? This aide might not be the right person- fit to…

Jessica Lopez: Yeah.

Alycia Anderson: …really get to where Jessica needs to be in this process. I love that. I love it. I love it. Okay, so confidence, let’s talk about it. You take the confidence from a little girl in performing arts, singing, dancing, acting, I’m assuming doing all the things. And today as a woman, especially with a disability, we often are trying to figure out how to take up space in the way that we want to be seen, to lead, to show up in our own authentic way. Talk about getting to there, ’cause you’re definitely doing that now in your career. How do you take that confidence from a little girl into growing into a woman?

Jessica Lopez: Oh, I love that question. It is, for me actually, it was I had the right foundations, but getting to the point of now is a very different journey. I have a very obvious disability. You can see that I have, a disability. I use a power wheelchair. When I was in elementary school, I also did prosthetics.

But I absolutely hated them. I just… they were hot, they’re heavy, I can’t feel what I’m doing. It’s just not viable for me to use prosthetics. And so that was, I think, one of the first times that I was, like, trying to figure out okay, it’s like an expectation for people with limb loss to use prosthetics, but why isn’t it fitting for me?

So I really started wrapping my head around what that was. What I ended up realizing over time, especially as I became more adept in using prosthetics making sure they’re the right fit for me both physically. It was the fact that prosthetics are really built for people who had limbs and lost them.

That was the origination of prosthetics. It was specifically for people who were in wars, who had lost their limbs, and they weren’t able to adapt to losing them, so they brought them in to replace what they thought they had lost, which is totally a valid thing to do. But for me I don’t– I don’t feel like I’m missing anything.

There’s not anything that I feel like I’m compensating for. All of my limbs are the way they are. I’ve learned how to do things in my own way. And so that was really, I think, started helping me understand that my perspective might not be the way other people with with disabilities’ perspectives are just because of the fact that my disability is so unique.

So when I came of age, I started saying “I just don’t think this is ever really gonna work for me.” What I’ve learned is that most people who have four-limb differences also say the same thing. It just doesn’t work for people like us. But then once I came into my teenage years, I developed a chronic illness.

My chronic illness is not related to my physical disability but it is something that completely flipped my life upside down. I was planning to go into middle school. I was gonna start doing volunteer work. I had been talking to my mom about doing cheerleading. When I got to high school, that was a goal of mine and it all ground to a halt.

I wasn’t able to continue with my education anymore. I really fell behind. I went from a straight A student to being, like, 100% truant in my classes just because I wasn’t able to keep up with it. My chronic illness just wasn’t letting me expend the energy that I needed to. During that time there was a possibility of doing independent study.

So my school district would send a teacher out to come teach me and I would do independent homework and then return the homework. But a lot of the time when I was able to see the teacher. They weren’t able to come at a moment’s notice. And when I wasn’t feeling up to it, a teacher, might be scheduled to see me, but I’m not really feeling up to it.

So there was a lot of mismatch between my body, like cooperating and the schedule of the teacher who had, 10 other students that they had to teach. So I fell behind in school. By the time I was 18, I had not graduated. My goal was to graduate high school by 16 and that just all fell out of the picture.

By the age of 22, I still hadn’t graduated high school until COVID. There was a theory that I had was that online education might be a possibility for me, that I could log in and study and do my homework in a way that is I don’t have to deal with physical paperwork.

I don’t have to physically use my arms and put them together to write things. I can really do everything all in one hub. And that was something that I had proposed to my school district like 10 years before COVID and they just said that wasn’t a possibility. I later found out that my school district did have an online learning program, but they didn’t tell me that.

I didn’t find that out until COVID when they expanded that because they had to as a result of COVID. And that completely changed the way I see the world. It really helped me realize that like my body was not the reason why I wasn’t able to do the things that I was hoping to do. It was really a result of a systemic barrier and a result of, multiple people within a system not being willing to investigate and look a little bit further to try to find some sort of solution for me to do things.

After COVID, I completed two years of high school in less than four months, and I graduated. And then I went to online community college. And so I think that is a very long-winded way of kinda telling that story. If I had, all of the right things in place when I was in elementary school, even with such a rare disability.

But as soon as one additional thing like barrier came up in my body things all fell apart. And so it can be a very precarious situation where it’s like they accommodate you in certain ways, but then that’s where they stop. That really helped me realize this is what I wanna do for the rest of my life.

If I had gotten the accommodations that I needed I could have graduated high school at 16, but instead I graduated at 22. So I decided to dedicate the rest of my life to telling that story and advocating for things to be different.

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Alycia Anderson: Have you ever wanted to come see me speak live? This is your invitation. Join me Friday, July 24th for a virtual Disability Pride keynote celebration that’s rooted in pride, access, identity, and action. Community, general admission, and corporate team tickets are available right now at learn.alyciaanderson.com. Go grab your tickets now, and I’ll see you on the 24th!

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Alycia Anderson: That’s an amazing story. I love that you started off the story with the prosthetics, and like realizing that your body’s your body. I think as congenital disability kids a lot of us are probably like that. I grew up with a lot of people going like maybe you’ll be able to walk one day and your legs this and that,” or, “Maybe if you do this, you’ll be able to…” And I was always just it was hard for me to connect the dots. That doesn’t seem like me.

Jessica Lopez: Yeah.

Alycia Anderson: So I love that you found that advocacy first of confidence in your own body. This is who you are, and it’s beautiful, and it’s powerful, and then putting those dots together from, a systemic, a personal story of navigating systems that do not take into consideration something happening medically.

Your chronic illness takes over. You need to learn a different way. It’s still possible. Our greater society around us doesn’t even take it into consideration at all. It’s unbelievable. And so I can see, how you go from the little girl on stage to the maturing woman coming of age, and then moving into civil rights advocacy and the amazing things that you’re doing now.

Let’s talk a little bit about that. Tell me about your powerfuldreams. What you’re doing today, where you hope it takes you.

Jessica Lopez: I think the first thing that, like I, I knew I wanted to be a disability rights advocate, but that’s not a job title they tell you when you’re in elementary school. They tell you like you can be an astronaut, or you can be a teacher, or you can be the President of the United States or, whatever it is.

But they don’t tell you, you can be a disability rights advocate. So I knew that’s what I wanted to do after I graduated high school and started going into community college. But like the how am I supposed to do that? And so I just decided to start where I’m at. So in community college, I joined student government.

At the time, we were allowed to do it online because we were in the middle of COVID. And that was like where it all began. I just decided to start wrapping my head around how policy operates, how student government plays a role in education period and then how to bring my personal experiences into that advocacy.

And I had a really great experience. They were very receptive to the things that I talked about and advocated for. Initially I became like legislative affairs senator in student government and then about a year later became president of student government, and that was all a result of kind of the advocacy that I did both locally in my community college, within the community college district, and then statewide as well.

So the advocacy that I started in my community college, I took it all the way to the state level and passed a resolution that impacted all of the 120 community colleges in California. And from then I just decided to continue pushing those boundaries in wherever I found myself. So sometimes that might be like in the tech space, for example, like Amazon, and other times that might be in a policy space.

And then other times that might be both within media and representation as well. It really just started with me beginning where I’m at and seeing how I can use my perspective to change things and continue taking that all the way through my journey.

Alycia Anderson: I love it. So we have a good amount of corporate reach on this podcast. So I want you to say specifically, how a company works with you. If they’re trying to solve what problem or what problems that might be on the table, be specific.

Jessica Lopez: Okay. There’s so many things that I wanna say.

Alycia Anderson: Good.

Jessica Lopez: I think one of the biggest things when it comes to corporations especially are the fact that it’s very similar with any other sort of system. They have one way of operating, especially once you get into more prestigious organizations like, any sort of massive tech company like Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Facebook.

They are really both the giants within the world, but they also are leaders. Other companies take their cue from these companies. So a lot of times they can be really steeped within tradition, and it’s the same thing within education. You’re really– You’re thinking about, the people who are coming from a traditional education.

They graduated high school when they’re 18. They finish, their college by the time they’re 22, and they immediately go into the corporate workforce. But life doesn’t always look like that for a lot of people. People take different pathways. But I think one of the challenges for any sort of massive corporation is the fact that they can be so focused on trying to get that traditional employee or traditional intern or traditional CEO and really wipe out all of the other perspectives that they could have brought by expanding their worldview a little bit, expanding who they recruit a little bit and expanding the way they work with that person.

Now, both the accommodations they provide as well as the experiences that they get from that person serving and as well as the biases. I think it can be really challenging for a first-generation student like me or a first-generation corporate person who had never had anybody in their family work within, a law firm, for example, or work within an investment banking company like Goldman Sachs.

They’re really navigating that place in a new perspective but that serves that company just because they don’t have those experiences that can benefit them in a lot of ways. So that’s one of the big things that I’ve been working with corporations is thinking about how can you expand the pool that you’re working with and hire them, but also make sure that you’re promoting them and making them CEOs and making sure that they have power within the company as well.

Alycia Anderson: Yeah, and you’ve done such a great job with it. I know that you’ve worked on some really powerful iconic brand positioning strategies, digital strategy and advocacy that have become staples, honestly, in the movement that are recognizable and really powerful. I think you melding all those things together is, your platform is very powerful and like impact-oriented which is absolutely like a high priority for corporations, especially in today’s day and age of these movements and really needing to show return on investment of the investment of leaning into a lot of these initiatives.

Alycia Anderson: So I think it’s super powerful. You’re gonna go really far with this, I know it.

Jessica Lopez: Absolutely. And I think one of the big things I always try to emphasize in the work that I do. I do a lot of training for corporations that are looking to expand their inclusive marketing, making sure their marketing is accessible, their websites are accessible. I think one of the biggest things that is always a misconception, which is that it’s too expensive to make our website accessible.

It’s too expensive, it’s too time-consuming. It is… we don’t have the assets that we need. We have to hire a photographer that will come take photos of our disabled employees. There’s all of these different aspects of branding that have to go into it. But like one of the big things that I tell them is that the first thing is once you build that investment, it’s there for the length of your duration of your company.

You just have to start that investment. The second thing is that a lot of those initiatives build ROI far later down on the road. So one of the big things that I like to tell my clients is that especially when it comes to things like digital accessibility, you have to go in and manually update all of the images on your website and add alt text or image descriptions onto your website.

It’s really time-consuming. You have to pay somebody to do that. It takes a long time. But if you’re thinking about it, that can increase your SEO, it can increase your search engine optimization. There’s corporations that have invested in digital accessibility that have had a three thousand percent increase in SEO on Google and other search engines.

So there’s a massive way of getting that ROI back, and it’s not later on down the road. It can be immediate within the first year of that investment. But a lot of these companies don’t necessarily know those numbers. They don’t hear that. And that’s why, people like me come into the fold, which is that you gotta, be willing to bring in somebody that knows that.

And then also really drill that into your mind, which is that it’s that initial investment, but it’s gonna pay you back further down the road, both yourself, your business, your ROI, and your customers.

Alycia Anderson: And your searchability. I my husband builds websites too and does some digital and I always show up in the ads of speaking bureaus and things like that because we’re constantly taking advantage of exactly what you’re saying. No you have to do that if you wanna show up, and when you start actually committing to it, never look back.

Jessica Lopez: Yeah.

Alycia Anderson: Because, then you’re just in the mix of a messy mix. Like, why do you wanna be in the mix? Rise up. You know what I mean? Yeah, I think that’s really powerful. Congratulations on all your talents. I literally can’t wait to see, like, where you go and all the impact you make and the companies that you’re gonna work with and already are working with and have.

But great. And we need more people that are very specialized in your niche, that are, like, really drilling into these things, ’cause it really does change cultures too as you’re, like, building these things. So You’re girly. What makes you feel really good on stage or at a big event?

I know you like your speaking, your filling rooms with education. What’s one of the things that makes you feel powerful and polished when you roll in?

Jessica Lopez: Oh, that’s a good question. I think one of the biggest things, I love my hair. My hair is like my favorite thing about me. So if I have a good hair day, I feel like I’m in a good place. I have very thick hair. It’s very long. I’ve been growing it out and that’s one of my things that I like I always wanna make sure that it looks nice, it smells good, it, But also it’s something that is an accessory. The other thing is I am somebody that I’ve done a lot of investment into my clothes and making sure that I present myself in a way that is is creative and pretty, makes me feel good, but also is accessible to me.

It can be very challenging for me to find clothes that actually that I can put on and wear myself. There is a lot of very specific images. For example, zippers are not always accessible for me, so those kind of things can be really challenging for me. So when I find an outfit that really fits me, that I can wear independently it makes the world of a difference.

But the other thing is engaging with other people, like talking to them, seeing them, like both in the audience and also coming up to me afterwards. I enjoy hearing that feedback of especially things that really stood out to them that maybe they’ll remember or they’ll take away.

Those kind of things make me feel a lot better knowing that I’m giving them something that they go away with. And I think that can be really important. Anything that you do, you wanna make sure that there’s some sort of take away some sort of, something that they might have identified that they can do or work on in their corporation or in their company or in their team.

Those things make a world of a difference, and that’s what accessibility is. It’s a bunch of small practices and small little things, and they add up to a massive turnaround on a big scale.

Alycia Anderson: Yeah, we were talking about your cute outfit and I’m into a cute outfit too when I get on stage to just look good, feel good. You know what I mean? So I love that. So what’s your advice to the women that are coming up behind you that maybe haven’t found their confidence yet, or that are striving to ride a horse or take a stage or believe in their expertise to consult other companies or whatever their dreams might be? What is your advice to them in dream chasing their confidence to get to that next level?

Jessica Lopez: I think the best way to answer that is by telling a story of like when I started school I decided I really wanted to travel the world as a goal that I really had. I grew up in a low-income family, and so I didn’t really have the opportunity to really leave outside of like San Diego where I lived.

So the possibility of ever seeing the world was really like not really something. It was always more of a pipe dream than something attainable. And so it was a big goal of mine when I started school to find a way to travel. And one of the things that I did was like leaning more into like fellowships that provided travel opportunities, ways of both enriching my skill set, but also experiencing the world.

So that was like one of the biggest things that I focused on over the next four years of college. I did about 40 trips in four years. So I was traveling pretty much every month for quite a long time, both doing keynotes, doing fellowships, doing all of the things that I do. And I think one of the biggest things that I tell people is that especially young people, if you have a goal I know it can be very easy for somebody to just say “Go for it.”

And I know that’s not always the easiest thing, but for me it was just like I would see them in like scholarships, opportunities or, opportunity to do keynote and be like, “I don’t know if I have the expertise. I don’t know if I have twenty years of experience yet.

I don’t think I might be the right person for that.” But like, why not me, if it– Why would they choose me? Just flip it and say why not me? It could easily be you. It could be easily be the next person, but that’s not your decision. That’s the other person’s decision to make that. And if they say no, then that doesn’t necessarily reflect your worth.

It’s just not the right time or it’s not the right fit. And you find ano- a better time or a better fit and you find things opportunities that way. That was like one of the biggest philosophies that I had. And so like when I was in school, I really wanted to push myself. One of the opportunities that I had was the Obama-Chesky Voyager Scholarship.

When I looked at the first cohort, and they were all Ivy League students. They were from Harvard and Yale and Princeton, and I was I’m the community college student from like California. There’s a million Californians out here. I don’t think I’m gonna get something like that, but I just applied anyways.

I applied and six months later, they said I got the scholarship, and as a result I got, to pay the last two years of my tuition, but I also got the opportunity to travel the world. I spent six weeks traveling all over the U.S. evaluating accessibility in the travel industry. And one of the– my favorite things about the scholarship is that over the next ten years of– after graduation, I also get Airbnb credit to travel the world as well.

But I wouldn’t have had that opportunity if I hadn’t have just decided to start where I’m at and take small steps and keep applying to things that are bigger and bigger and see where it goes. You never know. Sometimes you might get a yes. Sometimes you might get a no. I get a lot of no’s.

I have a lot of scholarships and a lot of, no’s in my job applications. I have a whole tracking sheet, and there’s a lot of red on there, but you know how it’s all you need is that one yes.

Alycia Anderson: Yeah. that. How motivating. So we’re gonna leave all of your links and information, social media, LinkedIn, website, all the things, so anybody out there listening to this can reach out, hire you to speak, hire you to come in and help them with all the digital accessibility, the advocacy, the initiatives that they have going on within their company that are disability forward and beyond. And just congratulations on everything. Your story’s amazing. I could talk to you for another two hours. Lovely. did we miss anything?

Jessica Lopez: I think one thing that I wanna say is that I think we are in a, especially in 2026 and especially over the last couple of years, it can be very intimidating to worry about whether or not accessibility? Do you have a budget for accessibility? Do you have, buy-in from your leaders?

A lot of companies are getting rid of their DEI, and so they’re throwing the baby out with the bathwater and including disability in with that. I think it can be very difficult for corporations to try to tow the line between both political narratives, other narratives, and then also balance their, finances as well.

I think the biggest thing that I like to say to, the clients that I work with is the fact that you are doing yourself a service by incorporating these accessibility practices. You’re doing yourself a service to hire people with disabilities, to be your photographer, to be your marketer, to be your subject in your photo shoots.

All of those things benefit your corporation at a three times rate. You’re looking at tripling your ROI when you invest in accessibility. You’re looking at including, better ROI within your employee, retention. You’re looking at all of the things… Like the biggest thing that I’ve discovered, and I’ve done a lot of research into this both within my thesis within other things, is that there is a lot of money in accessibility and there is a lot of grants.

There’s a lot of funding out there. There’s a lot of tax incentives out there to use accessibility and build it out. And it boosts the economy like nothing else. And especially when we’re in an economic downturn like we are now, that accessibility is gonna be the reason that your company can stay afloat because you’re gonna be marketing towards that 30% of Americans with disabilities.

And you might be able to bring somebody, with that expertise into your team can lead your next initiative. And all of those things make a big difference especially when it comes to, things like whatever dreams that your corporation has for whatever it is that you wanna do next.

If you build that accessibility in from the start, then you’re gonna massively change the trajectory of your company.

Alycia Anderson: I love it. Powerful. Okay, we’re wrapping up. Pushing forward moment. Little motivation quote you live by, something that you wanna gift away to our community today.

Jessica Lopez: That’s really good… I think the biggest thing, Is that my pushing forward moment is knowing that there are so many people with disabilities out there waiting to be asked waiting to be asked to be hired. They’re waiting to be asked whether or not your services work for them.

They’re just waiting to be asked. And I meet them on a day-to-day basis. And they’re always people who are gonna give perspectives that you’re never gonna hear otherwise. So for me, it’s just ask. If you don’t know how to build accessibility, find somebody and ask them. If you don’t know, whether or not it’s gonna be too expensive, find a finance person or find somebody who’s willing to walk you through what that investment might be.

Ninety percent of accommodations cost nothing. And it’s the same thing in marketing as well. If you hire a photographer who’s already inclusive then you’re not spending more. You’re already hiring somebody who’s inclusive, and you would’ve paid the same thing if you had hired a photographer who wasn’t inclusive.

Alycia Anderson: I love it. I love it. Thank you for coming on the show, Jessica.

Jessica Lopez: Thank you so much for inviting me. This is always a lot of fun talking with you.

Alycia Anderson: I same. I’m so happy our paths have crossed in life. thank you to our community for joining us. I’m sure that you love this. I’m inspired. I’m ready to go ask some more things myself. Thank you for everybody showing up. Please share, subscribe, leave reviews, all the things. Follow Jessica, reach out to her to work with her. This has been Pushing Forward with Alycia and Jessica, and that is literally how we roll on this podcast. We will see you next week.