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Daaiyah Bilal-Threats is a labor, social justice, and public education advocate who has worked for large-scale social change her entire career, beginning with the World Wildlife Fund, American Red Cross, and the Health Information Network. She currently serves as the education policy leader for the nation’s most powerful union, overseeing NEA’s policy development and advocacy with a focus on both domestic and international education policy. As part of her role, she also directs NEA’s research, disability rights and inclusion, health and safety, and international divisions.

Under Daaiyah’s leadership, NEA instituted a new Disability Rights and Inclusion initiative that has attracted support by the Ford Foundation. The effort expands professional learning on accessibility and inclusion and strengthens the NEA Disability Rights Resource Cadre, a team of member experts that create resources for educators supporting students with disabilities. She has also convened a national roundtable of leading organizations committed to defending disability rights amid growing threats to civil rights and public education. Additionally, she oversaw the launch of NEA’s nationwide Disability Rights Book Club which has raised awareness and fostered discussion within the education community across more than 40 states.

For over 20 years, Daaiyah has advised movement leaders, run winning political campaigns, championed the cause of quality public education internationally, and has helped lead some of the progressive movement’s most important organizations. She currently serves in leadership roles with the American Prospect Magazine, Learning First Alliance, NEA Foundation, and the National Committee for Responsive Philanthropy.

Written by Daaiyah Bilal-Threats

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   Equity and inclusion 3 December 2025

   Keeping humanity at the center: Accessibility and artificial intelligence in education

   Daaiyah Bilal-Threats, Brittany J. Patrick, Ph.D.

   In a classroom in upstate New York, a special education teacher pulls up a set of Tobii eye-tracking devices, each calibrated to a student’s unique gaze patterns. Around the room, quiet concentration fills the air as students with cerebral palsy and autism prepare to begin their writing activity. Instead of...

   Keeping humanity at the center: Accessibility and artificial intelligence in education