Championing Disability Rights: The Outini's on Journalism and DateKeepers' Journey

The Caring Economy with Toby Usnik

Itto Outini is an international journalist, Fulbright scholar, human rights activist, accessibility advocate, and author of the forthcoming memoir Blindness is the Light of My Life. She holds an MA in journalism and strategic media from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, has practiced print and radio journalism in the US and Morocco, and has been invited to speak for organizations including Cal Tech University, Verizon Wireless, and North Seattle College.

Her work experience spans the for- and non-profit sectors and includes a stint with the United Nations Development Programme. In 2021, she founded Fulbrighters with Disabilities, a global, virtual chapter of the Fulbright Association dedicated to supporting students and scholars with disabilities around the world. In June of 2022, she made history by co-chairing a panel at the 15th Session of the Conference of State Parties to the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. That same year, her life story was featured on BBC Outlook, and she and her husband, Mekiya Outini, co-founded The DateKeepers, an international media platform committed to publishing independent journalism, showcasing untold stories, and highlighting well-lived lives, especially those of people with disabilities, advocates, and allies worldwide.

Mekiya Outini is a writer and co-founder of the DateKeepers, an international media platform. He earned his MFA in fiction from the University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, and his short stories, essays, and poems have appeared in outlets such as Chautauqua Literary Journal, the Michigan Quarterly Review, and Willow Springs, respectively. His unpublished novel, Ashes, Ashes, has been selected as a finalist or semi-finalist in several contests, including the Chanticleer Somerset Awards, and its first two chapters were published in the West Trade Review. He lives with his partner in business and life, Itto Outini, in Kansas City, MO.

Fulbright Scholar | Human Rights Activist | Founder of Fulbrighters with Disabilities | Co-Founder & Journalist at The DateKeepers | [phone] |