Last week the Obama Administration through the Office of Civil Rights sent school districts across the country a guidance document that outlines the rights of students with disabilities to participate in school athletics.
The thirteen page document outlined five principals and provided specific examples for enforcement of civil rights law. School Districts were informed when offering sports they cannot generalize students with disabilities. Schools must consider each student and provide “reasonable modifications” to games but not “fundamental alterations” that would significantly change the game or give students with disabilities an advantage. Additionally, schools must provide students with disabilities on teams the same aides after school as they would have during the school day[i].
The action taken by the Office of Civil Rights is a significant win for parents who have children with disabilities who have championed the cause for school sports being inclusive. It is well known the benefits participation in sports has on building a healthy lifestyle, leadership and character traits. For students with disabilities, participation in school sports has additional benefits.
Participation in school sports helps students with disabilities build relationships with non-disabled peers. The stigmas and misinformation attached to students with disabilities in an academic setting become transferred into the non-academic realm. The generalizations and assumptions made by non-disabled peers and coaches hinder the opportunity to view disabled students as a teammate.
If coaches and non-disabled peers truly understood that students with disabilities have the intangible qualities they seek in a teammate, the Office of Civil Right would not have to be involved. On a daily basis, students with disabilities show courage, determination, and full effort to overcome the challenges of their disability. Their academic lives are filled with meeting the goals and objectives in their Individualized Education Plan (IEP) so they know what their task is and understand the road that leads to success. These are the qualities every coach coveted by every coach.
The guidelines by the Office of Civil Rights should provide the opportunity to demonstrate the abilities of disabilities. Once the stigmas fall away and assumptions corrected, inclusive school sports teams will be the norm. Hopefully, years later people will look back on the action taken by the Obama Administration and celebrate it as an historic moment in our history and we will wonder why it took so long for it to be done.
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