The 2012 awards program, held at Quaker Station, will begin with Bill Memberg, recently listed by the Cleveland Plain Dealer as one of the “Community Heroes” of NE Ohio. He is the founder and president of RePlay for Kids, a nonprofit agency that repairs and adapts toys for children with disabilities. By guiding toy drives and hosting toy workshops, his organization has modified toys that can be used by of hundreds of children, many of whom never before felt the sensation of making a doll talk or a race car run.
Mr. Memberg launched the initiative soon after he graduated from Case Western Reserve University (CWRU), when he responded to a request in The Plain Dealer by the developmental disability board seeking someone to repair broken toys. As someone who liked to fix things, Mr. Memberg immediately became engaged, and his work progressed from fixing broken toys to designing new toys for children.
In addition to leading RePlay for Kids, Mr. Memberg is active in the field of biomedical engineering. After receiving his master’s degree in biomedical engineering from CWRU, he started working with the Cleveland Functional Electrical Stimulation (FES) Center, a research program that combines the people and resources of the VA Medical Center, CWRU, and MetroHealth Medical Center to develop implantable electrical stimulation devices to restore functional movement to people who are paralyzed. He continues to work with the Cleveland FES Center as a Senior Biomedical Engineer.
Whether he is helping spinal cord injured patients, or children with disabilities, his approach is to use common sense when facing new problems, be creative but practical in terms of finding solutions, choose a topic that you are passionate about, and find time to volunteer to serve your community.