Disability Employment Awareness Month? A race every body can join.
October is National Disability Employment Awareness Month. Mark it with something better than a poster: a team challenge where walking, wheeling, swimming, stretching — any movement — counts.
Avatars advance with every activity logged — 80+ types, all counting equally toward the team's route.
Teams that have raced with Racery
7 Disability Employment Awareness Month ideas for work (2026)
NDEAM, led by the U.S. Department of Labor every October, celebrates the contributions of workers with disabilities. One in four US adults lives with a disability — many invisible. Here are seven ways to make the month participatory instead of performative.
Run an any-movement-counts team challenge
A virtual route your whole team travels together, where wheelchair miles, aqua fitness, walks, and stretching all count equally. No pace, no podium pressure — participation is the point. How it works.
Hand the mic to your disability ERG
Let ERG members who want to share tell their stories — in a panel, a newsletter series, or milestone messages inside your team challenge. First-person beats corporate-voice every time.
Host a disability inclusion lunch-and-learn
Bring in a speaker on disability etiquette, invisible disabilities, or accessible hiring. One strong session does more than a month of posters.
Audit something for accessibility
Pick one thing — your careers page, your office entrance, your all-hands slides — and fix its accessibility gaps during October. Publish what you changed.
Take an adaptive sports class together
Seated volleyball, adaptive yoga, wheelchair basketball with a local club. Able-bodied teammates experience adaptive play; everyone logs it as challenge activity.
Tie team milestones to a donation
Peg company giving to your team's collective progress — supporting a disability employment nonprofit your ERG selects. Movement becomes measurable support.
Make a captioning and alt-text pledge
Use the month to make captions on videos, alt text on images, and live captions in meetings the default. Small habits, permanent inclusion.
How a Racery NDEAM challenge works.
Pick an accessible route
Choose from Racery's library or co-build a custom route. Your ERG shapes the milestones and stories; we configure the race, bling and emails.
We build itInvite your team
One registration link. Members log any movement manually in seconds on web or app, or sync Garmin, Fitbit or Apple Watch.
No app requiredRace, then report
Real-time feeds, photo gallery and team totals during the race. A post-race report for leadership after — participation, trends and milestones.
Post-race reportIf your body moves, it counts.
Racery challenges include 80+ activity types, manual logging for anyone without a tracker, screen-reader-compatible pages, and no requirement to download an app. Teams across time zones contribute to one shared goal — no one is left out because of ability, location, or schedule.
NDEAM is also a chance to show colleagues with disabilities, visible or not, that inclusion at your company is structural, not seasonal. A participatory challenge — shaped by your ERG, joined by everyone — makes that point better than any awareness email.
What your team gets.
Any-movement logging
Wheelchair miles, aqua fitness, stretching — 80+ types count equally.
Manual logging in seconds
No tracker required; log on web or app in about 10 seconds.
Real-time photo gallery
A healthy Instagram: racer photos in one live stream.
Flexible leaderboards
Celebrate team totals — individual rankings are optional.
Digital bibs and finish awards
Personalized with each racer's name — everyone finishes.
Wearable sync
Garmin, Fitbit and Apple Watch logging, if you allow it.
"Thanks for all your help – we had such a successful race!"
Inclusion that already raced.
- A wheelchair athlete challenged his coworkers to a Racery race — and won hearts doing it
- "Move What You Can" community challenges run on Racery
- Teams at AWS, Genentech, Biogen, BlackRock and BCG have raced with Racery
- Hosting virtual races since 2014
NDEAM challenge FAQs.
October, every year. NDEAM is led by the U.S. Department of Labor's Office of Disability Employment Policy, and 2026 marks its observance across workplaces nationwide.
Disability Pride Month is July, marking the ADA's anniversary and celebrating disability identity. NDEAM, in October, focuses on employment — the contributions of workers with disabilities and inclusive hiring. Both deserve marking; many teams run their bigger program in October.
Yes — that's the design brief. Wheelchair activities, seated exercise, swimming, stretching, and meditation all count. Participants choose what to log; nobody is ranked on pace.
Please do. ERGs typically pick the route, write or approve milestone stories, and decide which organization receives any donation component. We handle the mechanics.
Setup is $0. In self-serve races, each racer pays Racery's per-racer fee at registration; sponsors who prepay racer fees unlock branding, pindrops and concierge support. A month-long challenge for a 100-person team typically lands around $1,800 all-in — see pricing or get a quote for your headcount and dates.
Typically one to three weeks from kickoff to launch. Planning in August or September gives your ERG time to shape the route and stories before October 1.
More months your ERGs will ask about.
Hispanic Heritage Month
A route through Latin American landmarks with e-postcards and culture trivia along the way.
Plan HHMBreast Cancer Awareness Month
The biggest charity race month of the year — donations unlock as your team moves.
Plan OctoberVeterans & Military Families
A memorial route with team relays and pindrops honoring service.
Plan Veterans DayBlack History Month
Routes past HBCUs and landmark moments — Q1 dates book out in Q4.
Plan FebruaryERG Engagement Platform · Pride Month · Corporate Wellness · Solutions · Pricing · Contact us
October routes are booking now.
NDEAM planning peaks in August and September — your ERG needs runway to shape the route and stories. Scope your race this week.