What it means to be a Unified Champion High School

I was surprised when they first asked me to host the Unified Champion School Banner Presentation Assembly at my high school. Unified sports or activities were never a major part of my daily life at Simsbury High- or at least so I thought. Even so, I accepted the opportunity, of course, as it was a great honor to be chosen to represent our school at such an important event. And although at I first might have thought they picked the wrong person for the job, I am forever grateful I was given the opportunity to co-host this event as I got to see how important Unified Sports are at my school.

I think the special thing about my high school is that students with special needs are so integrated into the school that you may not even realize how big of a presence there is. By this, I mean that students with special needs are in so many of my classes that it is not necessarily seen as “different”- it’s just another population of students at our school. Until the banner presentation assembly, I had never realized how many students with intellectual disabilities I have encountered at SHS. In my choir classes, for example, there are multiple kids with varying degrees of disability. And some of these students are good enough that they’re in far more selective choirs than I am currently in. Essentially, special needs is not a taboo subject at our school; it is something that is understood and even celebrated.

Another thing I don’t think I fully understood before the banner presentation was the amount of support that special needs students receive from their peers at SHS. I guess I haven’t noticed it fully because it’s always just been this way. But when the Unified Sports team played during the rally, I finally understood what these people represent to the overall student body- HOPE. For example, during the unified soccer game at the assembly, the football players let out raucous cheers as a kid with severe autism scored the winning goal. They did not laugh at him or mock him; instead he was celebrated for showing his strength. That is special and that is something that belongs in every school.

I also realized how understanding my classmates are towards people with special needs. For example, one of my best friends went to junior prom with a student struggling with Asperger’s. She, by no means, had to do this; nor was she pressured into doing so. Rather she went to prom with him because she wanted him to feel accepted. Our school definitely breaks the Hollywood stereotype in regards to the treatment of kids with disabilities. There is no scene in Mean Girls where the football team cheers kids with disabilities playing soccer. There is not a part in High School Musical where they take a friend who has autism to junior prom. But this happens at our school. And I believe that we all should strive for the day that this happens at every school in America.