As sure as night is dark and day is light. I keep you on my mind both day and night. And happiness I've known proves that it's right. Because you're mine, I walk the line

                Our first Summit class began with a lot of us discovering that we aren’t so different after all. The activity where we “walked across the line” opened the eyes to a lot of us in class. What I mean by this is that, even though we couldn't explain why we did or did not cross the line, we all might have had our own predictions on what we thought people would or would not cross the line for. We really became closer by learning a little more about each other. What really struck me was when I walked across the line, when it was asked whether we had lost a parent, and I felt like people were looking at me with sympathy and genuinely felt bad that I had crossed the line for that. I guess I just wasn't expecting anyone to feel bad for me because of it. Everyone seemed to be taking the activity seriously, however we were still able to have a few laughs and have a good time during the activity. In the end we were able to appreciate the point of the activity, which was reminding us that we don’t know what everyone is going through and how important it is for us as leaders to not just lead people, but to listen to them, notice changes in their behavior, and then be able to react based on what we’ve seen or heard. This is especially important when working with children in the Special Olympics because you have to know how to react to a child that gets upset easily, and remember to listen to them instead of just talking at them/telling them what to do.

            -Suzy

Our community partner’s website is:

http://www.specialolympics.org/mission.aspx

Mission Statement:

“The mission of Special Olympics is to provide year-round sports training and athletic competition in a variety of Olympic-type sports for children and adults with intellectual disabilities, giving them continuing opportunities to develop physical fitness, demonstrate courage, experience joy and participate in a sharing of gifts, skills and friendship with their families, other Special Olympics athletes and the community. “

Interested in getting involved? You can go to the website below or ask one of us!

            http://www.specialolympics.org/volunteers.aspx