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This paper discusses demands and challenges of being an educator with a disability and includes a review of the literature and an analysis of an interview with a leading educator with a disability. The paper opens with a discussion of the definitional issues and implications of the terms "handicap " and "disability." Literature on the role of the educator in today's society is reviewed, followed by a review of the challenges of being an educator with a disability. These challenges are organized around responses of a successful educator, Wendell J. Lewis, Section Administrator for the Disability Determination Services for the State of Kansas and an African-American with muscular dystrophy, to questions concerning the following themes: (1) family support; (2) least restrictive environment, integration, and inclusion; (3) lifespan challenges; (4) self-efficacy; and (5) federal legislation and advocacy. Ways to provide needed special resources or to restructure education positions are suggested. (Contains 35 references.) (DB) Reproductions supplied by EDRS are the best that can be made from the original document