[5] After graduating from Stanford in 1943 with a Bachelor of Science degree in sociology,[6] she moved to Washington, D.C. and worked for the Special War Problems Division of the U.S. State Department.

Kennedy eventually moved to the U.S. Justice Department as executive secretary for a project dealing with juvenile delinquency.

[2] She shifted the organization's focus from Catholic charities to research on the causes of intellectual disabilities, and humane ways to treat them.

[8] A long-time advocate for children's health and disability issues, Shriver championed the creation of the President's Panel on Mental Retardation in 1961.

[13] That year, the Joseph P. Kennedy Jr. Foundation helped to plan and fund the First International Special Olympics Summer Games, held in Chicago's Soldier Field where 1,000 athletes with intellectual disabilities from 26 states and Canada competed.

[22] For her work in nationalizing the Special Olympics, Shriver received the Civitan International World Citizenship Award.

[30] Shriver received the 2002 Theodore Roosevelt Award (the Teddy),[31] an annual award given by the National Collegiate Athletic Association to a graduate from an NCAA member institution who earned a varsity letter in college for participation in intercollegiate athletics, and who ultimately became a distinguished citizen of national reputation based on outstanding life accomplishment.

In addition to the Teddy recognition, she was selected in 2006 as part of the NCAA Centennial celebration as one of the 100 most-influential individuals in its first century; she was listed ninth.

[32] In 2006, she received a papal knighthood from Pope Benedict XVI, being made a Dame of the Order of St. Gregory the Great (DSG).

[35] In 2008, the U.S. Congress changed the NICHD's name to the Eunice Kennedy Shriver National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

As part of the Portrait Competition prize, the NPG commissioned a work from the winning artist to depict a living subject for the collection.

Lenz, whose son, Sam, has Down syndrome and is an enthusiastic Special Olympics athlete, was inspired by Shriver's dedication to working with people with intellectual disabilities.

[42] In 1990, Shriver wrote a letter to The New York Times denouncing an abortion rights group for having used a quotation of President Kennedy's words out of context in support of their position.

[43][44] Shriver was one of several prominent Democrats – including Governor Robert P. Casey of Pennsylvania and Bishop Austin Vaughan of New York – who took out a full-page The New York Times advertisement opposing "abortion on demand" during the 1992 Democratic Convention (the Party adopted a 1992 platform that emphasized its support for abortion rights).

[62]President Barack Obama remarked after Shriver's death that she was "an extraordinary woman who, as much as anyone, taught our nation—and our world—that no physical or mental barrier can restrain the power of the human spirit.

"[63] On August 14, 2009, an invitation-only Requiem Mass was celebrated for Shriver at St. Francis Xavier Roman Catholic Church in Hyannis.

[65] Because her brother Ted had terminal brain cancer, he was unable to attend the funeral, and their sister Jean Kennedy Smith stayed with him.

Ted died two weeks later, leaving Jean as the sole surviving child of Joseph and Rose Kennedy until her death on June 17, 2020, at the age of 92.