Howard started as the Chief Executive Officer of the NAD in April 2011 and also serves as an ex officio member of the NAD Board of Directors. He comes to the NAD after 22 years as a lawyer, focusing his practice on disability rights and special education law. For nine years, he was a Senior Attorney at Equip for Equality, the Protection & Advocacy entity for Illinois. The previous 10 years, he worked as an associate at Monahan & Cohen, and briefly as a legal counsel at Access Living, the center for independent living in Chicago. In 1997, he founded the Midwest Center on Law and the Deaf, and served as Board Chair until 2011. In 2010 and again in 2014, President Barack Obama appointed Howard to serve on the United States Access Board. Howard has a Bachelor of Science degree in computer engineering from the University of Arizona and a Juris Doctor degree from the Illinois Institute of Technology Chicago-Kent College of Law. Born and raised in Chicago, he is a diehard fan of Chicago sports teams. Howard also enjoys traveling the world to meet deaf people in other countries and learning their sign languages.