Changing How the World Sees Disability.
Author. Speaker. Advocate. Dan Vander Plaats has spent 30 years helping churches, schools, and organizations move from awareness to belonging, one community at a time.
Real Inclusion Starts Here
Disability touches every community. But awareness alone is not enough. Most communities already want to include people with disabilities. The harder question is why so many don't and what actually has to change for that to be true. That's the question Dan has spent his career answering.
Dan equips pastors, nonprofit, school, and organizational leaders with the theological and visionary clarity to lead their communities toward gospel-centered diversity and inclusion. This is not a program to install but a framework for setting expectations and direction rooted in Scripture and shaped by work across six continents. The goal isn't awareness. It's seeing people with disabilities as what they actually are: co-laborers in God's redemptive plan, and leading a community into that reality.
Ways to bring this work to your community
The 5 Stages
A framework for understanding where your community actually stands on disability inclusion and what it takes to move forward.
Developed by Dan over 30 years of real-world use, translated into 27 languages, and used by organizations across six continents. .
Speaking
Dan is one of the most trusted disability ministry speakers in the Christian world. His signature framework, The 5 Stages, has reshaped how churches, seminaries, and nonprofits understand disability inclusion. He speaks from the stage and from personal experience.
The Book
Changing Attitudes about Disability makes a Scripture-rooted case that people with disabilities are not recipients of charity. They are partners in God's mission. And your church is incomplete without them.
Trusted by:
Dan’s Global Impact
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300+ CHURCHES
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27 LANGUAGES
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6 CONTINENTS
“For years, the 5 Stages model has been the single most helpful resource I’ve used to train staff, volunteers, ministry leaders, and churches in disability inclusion. It is clear, practical, and easy to teach, yet deep enough to reshape how people think about dignity, belonging, and ministry.
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Fellowship of Christian Athletes