Student-athlete with Down syndrome, denied chance to play, becomes state champ.

BY ADAM CASSANDRA

November 28, 2012 (HLIWorldWatch.org) - Student-athlete Eric Dompierre is a state champion football player, winner of Sports Illustrated’s “Underdogs” contest and an all-around inspirational young man. And he has Down syndrome.

Eric, who attends Ishpeming High School in the Upper Peninsula (U.P.) of Michigan and is a kicker for the school’s varsity football team, wasn’t sure if the state of Michigan would even allow him to participate in sports this year. Michigan High School Athletic Association (MHSAA) regulations barred him, and others with disabilities, from playing athletics after turning nineteen-years-old before September 1.

Students with Down syndrome and other developmental conditions sometimes require extra years of schooling in their early years, making them older than their classmates in their senior year of high school. Currently 26 states do not allow waivers for older students with disabilities to play sports past an established age requirement deadline.

Eric and his father, Dean, fought for two years trying to convince the MHSAA to create a waiver policy allowing student-athletes with disabilities to play one year past the current maximum age.

“Michigan’s kids with disabilities should not have to beg their leaders for relief,” Dean said, adding the MHSAA should change its policy “not because they have to, but because it’s the right thing to do.”

After an outpouring of support for Eric, and petitions to overturn the policy from across the nation, the MHSAA announced in late May the approval of a new age waiver policy:

A two-thirds majority of votes cast is required to change the MHSAA Constitution. In a vote of schools conducted this month, 701 of 1,535 MHSAA member senior high and junior high/middle schools cast legal ballots, and 94 percent approved of the change. … As a result of that vote, the Association’s age rule, under which a student who turns 19 prior to September 1 of a school year is ineligible for interscholastic athletics, may now be waived by the MHSAA Executive Committee.

“I’m very excited,” Eric said after learning that he would be allowed to play football.

“It’s a great sense of relief,” said his father Dean. “I’m proud of the way he (Eric) has handled himself through this whole thing. He helped not only himself, but he helped out some other kids from the state. I also feel thankful for all the people who helped us out in this and made this thing happen.”

But Eric’s story didn’t end there.

His football team, the Hematites, went on to win the MHSAA Division 7 state football championship last Friday with a near flawless season record. Eric kicked a number of extra points and even scored a touchdown during their championship season.

And on Tuesday, Sports Illustrated announced that Eric and his Hematites were the winners of their “Underdogs” contest, giving the school a $25,000 grant from Powerade and a trip to New York City for 10 of the team’s players to attend the magazine’s Sportsman of the Year event next week. But the Hematites are sticking together, and are trying to raise money to send the entire team to New York.

Sports Illustrated will pay for a charter bus for the whole Hematite squad to travel to New York, but the school needs to raise $3,200 to house and feed the students during the trip.

“The year as a whole has been quite remarkable,” said Eric’s father Dean. “Sometimes, it’s been remarkable in a negative way, or a sad way, and other times it’s been remarkable in a good way, but overall, it’s been quite a ride … We really want to thank everybody, not just in the U.P. but really all across Michigan and the country who went to bat for us, not only during our ‘Let ‘em Play‘ campaign, but also during this contest to help us come out on top.”

While studies have found that around 90 percent of women who receive a prenatal diagnosis of Down syndrome choose to have an abortion, stories like Eric’s show just how much of an inspiration and impact persons with disabilities can have on their families and their communities. Eric and the Hematites leave Monday for the Big Apple.

Check out this video about Eric: 

http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/student-athlete-with-down-syndrome-denied-chance-to-play-becomes-state-cham

"Some of her proudest moments, she says, was when she first started walking at six years of age and later in her life when she was able to realise her dream to study at Stellenbosch University."

Toni was born on the 8^th of December 1983 in Knysna. Due to the umbilical cord wrapping around her neck, she was starved of oxygen. Six minutes after her birth she still had an Apgar score of 0. Medical personnel could not be sure of what Toni’s future would hold A few months after her birth she was diagnosed with Cerebral Palsy (CP). In Toni’s case, her CP affects her speech, balance, and all motor function.  At the age of 6 years, after years of physiotherapy she began walking. For the next five years Toni attended boarding school in Port Elizabeth at Cape Receive School, a school for children with disabilities. After finishing grade 5 Toni was able to attend a private school in her home town, Plettenberg Bay.

Rector's Succeeding Against the Odds Recipients:
Daniella Badenhorst, Toni Mould &
 Amanda de Beer with Prof Russel Botman

After graduating from high school, Toni made her childhood dream come true by getting accepted to study at Stellenbosch University.  In 2006, two years after starting her BA degree in Humanities, she successfully gained entrance to the Social Work program  at Stellenbosch university, a course Toni was  told was closed to her because of her disability.   In 2007, Toni won the Rector’s Award for Succeeding Against the Odds, an award she held until her graduation in 2009. During her time at university she not only succeeded in her academics but was involved in campus life by actively participating in student committees and other activities such as Ballroom and Latin dancing for disabled. 

Toni cycling

 

Since graduating Toni has worked in the corporate world for eighteen months but soon returned to her passion of wanting to help others. She and a colleague founded Bridging Abilities where they aim to use sport, recreation camps and rehabilitation to improve the quality of life for persons with disabilities. Toni lives in her own flat in Stellenbosch and has recently started to compete in cycling for disabled.  

How the right team can change life's...

In the flash of a single random gunshot, JustinThompson's life changed forever!

"I knew from day one that I could do this. I just had to keep working."

A single gunshot let to a drastic change in Justin's life. He is a high school athlete who was now paralyzed from the waist down. According to the article from Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation Justin never lost the positive attitude that made him such a valuable part of his soccer and basketball teams. Justin's spinal cord was intact, and the bone chip in his T9 vertebra could be repaired. 

"Given what happened, this was the best possible way my injury could have worked out," he says. "I knew from day one that I could do this. I just had to keep working."

According to the article Justin's family needed a team as focused as he was on improving his strength, health and mobility, and they found one at the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation. Every day, Justin's father drives him to a Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation NeuroRecovery Network® (NRN) facility – a three hour round trip – for Locomotor Training. 

"It has helped me a lot," Justin says enthusiastically. "I've made a ton of progress, and they're pushing me to be as strong, healthy, and active as I can!"

Locomotor Training, a specific set of muscle motions to help Justin's body remember how to walk, is just one of the effective therapies that can be used to change someone's life, who has just acquired a spinal cord injury. 

Within South Africa there are very few accessible and affordable facilities available to individuals who acquire a disability, especially within the rural communities. Bridging Abilities aim to establish such a facility that is accessible to everyone who has or acquires a disability. We aim to help every individual that pass through our doors with the best possible rehabilitation, health and wellness and mobility therapies possible.  

Help us to establish a centre that is able to give to South Africans what the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation has given to Justin.

First Ever Backflip on a Sit Ski - Josh Dueck

Josh Dueck, a Canadian Paraplegic skier was the first man to land a backflip on a sit ski. Josh injured his spine in 2004 when he entered a jump too fast and overshot the landing. He fell a 100 feet and landed on his chest. When Josh regained consciousness, he had lost the use of his legs. However his passion for skiing did not end there. Josh learned to sit ski within a year after his injury and won a silver medal for Canada in the Whistler’s Paralympic Games in 2010 and a gold medal in 2011 X Games in mono ski cross. After many years of training and careful consideration and planning, he landed the first ever back flip in the show. 

“Here we were eight years later," says Dueck. "It was a challenge that had risk to it—to do a backflip on a sit ski. It had never been done. It was simply an internal challenge—a battle of ego and intuition” (Fitz Cahall).

Salomon Freeski TV S5 E13 Sit Ski Backflip

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xjUUf_sK84

“We all struggle with our own disabilities, our own challenges, whether they be physical, emotional, or spiritual,” says paraplegic freeskier Josh Dueck. “This was a deeply personal quest. There was a ton of risk involved with the backflip in the sit ski. It had never been done. There was a lot of fear.”

Josh’ story shows us that with hard work and determination our dreams can be accomplished, no matter what the obstacles.

No arms, no legs, no problem Bob

Bob Lujano really beat the odds after he lost his upper and lower extremities due to a rare blood disease in 1979. He is one of the most inspirational people I have met and although he has no arms or legs, its not a problem.

I met Bob at a conference in the USA, where he was one of the key note speakers and he just showed that with the right attitude, adaptive equipment and support, we can all make it, no matter what our circumstances.

He has been playing sport for many years and more in particular quad rugby, otherwise known as murder ball. If you do not know the sport, please do yourself a favor and click on the link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_kaT5dDiISw. Bob has been playing the sport for over 10 years and has won 5 US Quad Rugby National Championships, 3 medals playing for the USA team (one gold in the 1999 World Wheelchair Games and one silver in the World Championships and one bronze in the 2004 Paralympic Games). He currently works at the Lakeshore Foundation in Birmingham, Alabama, USA, where he really inspires people with disabilities to beat the odds.

Bob has two motto's in life and they are:
Matt 6:33 "Seek first the kingdom of God and all his rightousness will be added unto you"
and ofcourse
"No arms, no legs, no problem!"

London Paralympics 2012

Oscar Pistorius and Arnu Fourie in the 4 x 100 relay

Upon completion of the Olympic Games the cries for more sporting action was overwhelmingly answered by thousands of Paralympians.  In fact what was once seen by many as an after thought now just became part two of the greatest show on earth.  The extraordinary feats of speed, tenacity, and endurance caught the world’s attention, inspired and hopefully helped to change the way people with disabilities have been viewed. What was clear to everybody was that these courageous athletes were determined not to compete as disabled athletes, but as athletes with different abilities.

The excitement for these Games was further fuelled by the fact that this was the first time that the Paralympics were coming home to its spiritual birth place. The Paralympic movement was began in 1948 by Sir Ludwig Guttmann who started the Stoke Mandeville Games.  The Stoke Mandeville Games that were held for WWII veterans who had spinal cord injuries and coincided with the start of the 1948  London Summer Olympic Games.  the name ‘Paralympics’ (only used from 1988) refers to the fact that these Games were held parallel to the other Games, and has nothing to do with the word “paralyzed”.

Natalie du Toit

2012 may have marked a new era for the Games. It the largest Games ever with 4, 200 athletes from 164 countries competing in twenty different sports during eleven days of competition (fourteen countries made their debut at these Games, many of them from the continent of Africa) but social media, Internet and more television coverage brought the Games closer to us than ever before.  During the Games we could hear straight from the athletes who were using Facebook, Twitter and video blogs to communicate directly with their supporters.  Not only were 251 World Records broken but “the 2012 Paralympics have broken all records for attendance, with 2.7 million spectators cramming into venues and more than $70 million raised in ticket sales — both unprecedented figures as the British public displayed a previously unseen enthusiasm in the 52-year history of the Paralympics.” South Africa completed their campaign with 29 medals (8 gold, 12 silver and 9 bronze) 

Anrune Liebenberg, silver in the 400m
& bronze in the 200m T46 category.

As a person with a disability the experience of watching the Games left me with the feelings of acceptance and belonging to a group. The shame and shyness of my involuntary movements slipped off my shoulders for just a brief period. At long last, we were also important in the scheme of things! On the Sunday night as I watched the Paralympic flag being lowered, I found myself in tears. For as I saw the flag coming down, I felt as if the spotlight that had been on people with disabilities was being switched off. No longer would I be able to watch ‘my kind’ on tv nor would their victories be celebrated so openly and enthusiastically. I felt that people with disabilities who had been on show for the last 11 days were being put back into insignificance.

Ilse Hayse, gold in women's T13 long
jump & silver in 100m T13.

But as the two British athletes, Ellie Cole and Johnny Peacock, took the flame from where it had been burning for the last 11 days and transferred it to various torch bearers who carried it out of the stadium, it dawned on me that they were actually giving each of us a flame to carry with us to every sphere of life.  The Games may have broken many stereotypes and perceptions regarding people with disabilities but it is up to everyone of us who have enjoyed the Games to continue the bigger legacy of the Games – the fact that people with disabilities have a lot to offer our society and that every effort should be made to allow them to participate in everyday life! 

Fanie van der Merwe, gold in 100m T37

 These Games has yet again proven to me that organizations such  as Bridging Abilities, who aim to provide sport and recreation to those who don’t necessarily have access to it,  are  so important not only to the individual but to the nation as a whole. Sport can change lives, bring hope, inspire a nation, and provide a future for so many.  But as we have seen with our South African medallists, we need the support of corporate South Africa and individuals to provide funding for projects that will open the door of sport to those who could become the next Oscar Pistorius, Natalie du Toit, Fanie van der Merwe, or Roxy Burns.

Samkelo Radebe, Arnu Fourie, Oscar Pistorius & Zivan Smith, gold in the 4 x 100m