Accessible Compass

Accessible Compass was born from my own experience of suddenly becoming a person with a disability and discovering just how difficult it can be to find help.

In 2016, while five months pregnant with my son, I suffered a life-changing stroke. Along with learning how to live with a disability and raise a new baby, I found myself trying to navigate a complicated system of government benefits, disability programs, applications and community supports.

It took me six years to successfully access CPP Disability. Later, I discovered supports such as the Disability Tax Credit and Registered Disability Savings Plan. I kept wondering: if these programs existed to help people like me, why was it so difficult to find and understand them?

That experience became Accessible Compass.

Accessible Compass is an online platform that helps Canadians with disabilities, caregivers and families find benefits, programs, application information, appeal guidance and community resources in one accessible place. It is designed to answer one of the most overwhelming questions someone can face after becoming disabled: “Where do I start?”

This is not an idea I hope to build someday. I have already built and launched Accessible Compass using my own resources. I currently pay approximately $80 USD per month to host the platform while personally relying on disability income.

Despite being a new platform with a limited promotional budget, Accessible Compass has already received more than 16,355 visitors. That early response tells me that the need is real. Thousands of people are already searching for clearer, easier ways to understand the disability supports available to them.

My idea is to build on that momentum and expand Accessible Compass into a more comprehensive Canada-wide disability navigation resource. Funding would allow me to improve accessibility and usability, add and verify more federal, provincial and local resources, develop additional plain-language guides and tools, and reach more disability organizations and communities.

I have already built the foundation and demonstrated that people will use it. Field Law's support would help me expand its reach and impact so that thousands more Canadians can benefit.

I cannot change what happened to me, but I can use what I learned from it to make the path easier for the person who comes next.

Accessible Compass is designed to benefit Canadians with disabilities, their families, caregivers, and the people who support them.

The primary beneficiaries are people living with disabilities who are trying to understand what financial assistance, government benefits, community programs, equipment funding, tax measures, or other supports may be available to them. This includes people with physical, developmental, neurological, cognitive, and invisible disabilities, as well as people who have recently acquired a disability and suddenly find themselves navigating an unfamiliar system.

I understand that experience personally. After surviving a stroke while five months pregnant, I went from living my normal life to trying to understand an entirely new world of disability programs and systems. It took me six years to successfully access CPP Disability, and I later discovered other important supports, including the Disability Tax Credit and Registered Disability Savings Plan. I kept asking myself: why was this information so difficult to find?

Families and caregivers will also benefit. They are often the ones researching programs, completing applications, gathering documents, making phone calls, and advocating for someone they love. Accessible Compass gives them a starting point and helps reduce the amount of time spent searching across disconnected websites and organizations.

The platform can also benefit community organizations, disability advocates, social workers, healthcare professionals, and service providers. Rather than trying to remember every available program, they can direct people to a centralized resource where they can continue exploring options themselves.

Accessible Compass is particularly important for people who may face additional barriers, including those living in rural or northern communities, people with limited access to specialized services, and individuals who find complicated government language difficult to navigate.

Ultimately, the people who benefit are those who do not know what they do not know.

A benefit or program cannot improve someone's life if they never discover it exists. Accessible Compass is intended to close that information gap and help more Canadians with disabilities find the support, resources, and opportunities available to them.