A New Era for Ethical Direct Support: NADSP Releases Revised Code of Ethics

For more than 25 years, the National Alliance for Direct Support Professionals (NADSP) Code of Ethics has helped define what it means to provide high-quality, person-centered support to people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. It has guided direct support professionals (DSPs) through difficult decisions, reinforced professional values, and advanced the recognition of direct support as a skilled profession.

Now, NADSP has released a thoroughly revised Code of Ethics and a companion Code of Ethics Practice Guidelines & Guidebook that reflect the realities of today's direct support workforce while remaining grounded in the profession's enduring commitment to dignity, rights, inclusion, and self-determination. The revision comes at a time when DSPs face increasingly complex responsibilities. They support people in community settings, navigate new technologies, promote supported decision-making, and provide culturally responsive, person-centered services. The updated Code recognizes these changing expectations while providing practical guidance for ethical decision-making.

The revised Code was developed through an extensive national research and validation process led by the University of Minnesota's Institute on Community Integration (ICI) in partnership with NADSP. Rather than simply updating language, the project sought to ensure the Code reflects the realities of modern direct support. Subject matter experts, people with lived disability experience, DSPs, and frontline supervisors from across the country examined every principle of the original Code, identifying what remained timeless and where new guidance was needed.

ICI researchers conducted dozens of focus groups in which DSPs shared real ethical dilemmas from their daily work. Structured validation sessions used realistic scenarios to test whether proposed revisions were clear, relevant, and useful in practice. Through a consensus-building process, the research team ensured each ethical principle reflected today's expectations for high-quality, person-centered support. The process is built on ICI's long history of advancing the direct support profession. More than two decades ago, ICI also helped facilitate the development and national validation of the original Code of Ethics, making the 2026 revision a continuation of the Institute's longstanding commitment to strengthening the workforce through research and collaboration.

Every day, DSPs make decisions that affect people's rights, health, relationships, and opportunities. Many of these situations cannot be resolved by agency policy alone; they require ethical reasoning grounded in respect for the individual. The Code of Ethics serves as a professional compass, helping DSPs navigate difficult situations while keeping each person's goals, choices, and dignity at the center of every decision. Like the ethical codes that guide nurses, teachers, and social workers, it reinforces that direct support is a profession requiring sound judgment as well as technical skill.

“We ask organizations, associations, advocates, and governmental partners to endorse the revised Code of Ethics," said Joseph Macbeth, president and CEO of NADSP. "But more importantly, we ask direct support professionals across the nation to embrace it, teach it, and adopt it. This Code of Ethics belongs to you, and we want it to guide you in your daily practice."

For ICI Director Amy Hewitt, who helped lead development of both the original Code and its revision, the updated Code represents another milestone in the ongoing professionalization of direct support. "The Code of Ethics recognizes direct support professionals as skilled professionals whose daily decisions shape people's lives," she said. "It provides a common ethical framework that strengthens their judgment, reinforces their professional identity, and keeps the people they support at the center of every decision."

The revised Code is accompanied by the Code of Ethics Practice Guidelines & Guidebook, a practical resource that translates ethical principles into everyday action. Designed for DSPs, supervisors, provider organizations, educators, and workforce trainers, the guidebook addresses topics such as technology, confidentiality, documentation, supervision, continuing education, cultural competence, and person-centered support in home and community settings. It is available in both English and Spanish.

ICI also played a key role in developing educational resources that help organizations bring the revised Code into everyday practice. These include a redesigned Code of Ethics poster and brochure, training materials, and a series of short videos illustrating each of the Code's nine ethical tenets through realistic situations involving DSPs and the people they support. To maximize accessibility, the videos include captions, Spanish subtitles, audio description for viewers who are blind or have low vision, and American Sign Language interpretation, making them usable by the broadest possible audience.

The revised NADSP Code of Ethics is more than an updated publication. It reflects a renewed commitment to ethical, person-centered support and to recognizing direct support professionals as essential members of the disability workforce. By combining NADSP's leadership with ICI's expertise in workforce research, professional development, and knowledge translation, the revision provides the field with an ethical framework that is both evidence-based and practical.

The Code ultimately belongs to the direct support professionals who put its principles into practice every day. As DSPs embrace and apply the revised Code, they strengthen both the quality of support they provide and the profession itself. Provider organizations, educators, policymakers, advocates, family members, and other allies each have an important role to play by promoting the Code, incorporating it into training and professional development, and creating environments where ethical practice is expected, supported, and celebrated.

For the direct support profession, the revised Code remains what it has always been: a guide for ethical practice, a statement of professional values, and a promise to the people DSPs support every day.