Yesterday we highlighted a new program in Arizona that put high school students with disabilities in competitive athletics alongside and against their peers. But football fields, race tracks, and golf courses are not the only arenas for inclusion of people with disabilities in extracurricular activities that help teens build self-esteem, embrace uniqueness, and adopt a respectful, mature attitude.
Theater programs like the Unified Theater in Southington, Connecticut (not affiliated with the Special Olympics of Arizona Unified Sports® program from yesterday’s article) also provide the opportunity for collaboration between high school students working in separate classrooms. The program is just in its second year but already has 90 participants, says Journal-Record reporter Kimberly Primicerio, who describes the workings of the program thusly:
Unified Theater brings students and those who receive special education services together. Student leaders who received special training at a Unified Theater conference in Hartford in early October direct the rehearsals. Everyone works together to learn dance steps and song lyrics. The performers used sign language and sang along to ‘It’s a Small World’ and ‘The Bare Necessities.’
Artistic talent is a great equalizer, as special education teacher and Unified Theater adviser Karen Cavanaugh tells Primicerio. An honors student may not be able to sing as well as one of the students with disabilities, for example, but the club is not a place for judgments from internal or external audiences. Cavanaugh helps ensure this when staging performances by having everyone dress in the same green, tie-dyed T-shirts.
Interactions in the club pave the way for interactions in other high school settings, whether it’s the cafeteria, or bleachers, or even, as Primicerio observes, in the hallways, where it’s possible to pass by the same people every day and go unnoticed:
High school senior Ricky Davis, 18, and junior Brandon Brush, 16, have been in Unified Theater together for the past two years. If it wasn’t for the theater group, they would never have met. ‘I started seeing him in the hallways all the time,’ Davis said.
These extracurricular programs, as we pointed out yesterday, create tremendous long-term benefits for teens with disabilities and those without when they enter the workforce. It’s part of human nature that familiarity engenders comfort, and the experiences they have in programs like Unified Theater can instill a sense of confidence in a person’s capabilities when they are working side-by-side or evaluating a person with disabilities as a job applicant.
They also can awaken the passion to perform, as Tricia Cofiell tells reporter Maiken Scott in his article, “Miracles on State Street,” for the mid-Atlantic news conglomerate, NewsWorks. Cofiell’s son, Jake Spencer, could not find a creative outlet to replace singing in the chorus following graduation from his high school in Media, Pennsylvania. Five years ago, she got in touch with the Media Theatre for the Performing Arts on State Street, and proposed starting a program for people like Jake, who has Down syndrome, that would foster their interests.
To their good sense, the Media Theater agreed with Cofiell and established the State Street Miracles, a performance troupe comprised entirely of people with disabilities. They perform all around the mid-Atlantic region to rave reviews and just completed their annual holiday show, which includes inspirational songs like “We are the World,” “Don’t Stop Believing’,” and “Lean on Me” that deliver the message of inclusion, writes Scott:
Cofiell said the State Street Miracles provide a bridge between people with disabilities, and those without. During performances, the members introduce themselves to the audience — in a way asking their listeners to see them as people, and not people with a disability.
Tell us about your artistic pursuits in the comment section below. How have they helped you with other areas of your life, like your job and your home life?
Images by miss_rogue (Tara Hunt), used under its Creative Commons license.