Reverend Calvin Peterson is the founder and director of Disabled in Action. This non-profit organization aims to advocate, educate, and empower people with disabilities living in poverty, their families, and caregivers, emphasizing equity and inclusion. Rev. Peterson is also the author of Nothing is Impossible, his autobiography.

Calvin E. Peterson was born in Atlanta, Georgia, on March 30, 1948. At birth, he was diagnosed with a severe form of cerebral palsy. He graduated from Booker T. Washington High School in southwest Atlanta. 1978 he graduated with a B.A. in Liberal Arts from Long Island University. In 1970, Peterson and others founded the Atlanta-based organization Advanced Association for the Physically Handicapped to assist individuals with disabilities in communicating with employers, assistance agencies, and rehabilitation centers, among other purposes. Since 1984, Rev. Peterson has been an ordained African Methodist Episcopal Church minister and is an associate minister at Hunter Hills AME Church. In 1986, Rev. Peterson founded the non-profit organization, Disabled in Action (DIA), in Atlanta with a mission to advocate, educate and empower people with disabilities living in poverty, their families and caregivers, and with an emphasis on equity and inclusion.