Cold Lake High School (CLHS) was recognized for their work towards creating a more inclusive culture when it comes to athletes.
Special Olympics Alberta presented the school with the Unified School of the Year award during their annual lunch celebration in Edmonton on Saturday, Oct. 19.
“It’s recognizing a school that’s very active… and someone who’s advocating for Unified Sports in their area,” explained Kelly Eagles, CLHS athletic director and physical education teacher.
Although Unified Sports is different from the Special Olympics, Eagles noted they contribute to the same goal.
“Special Olympics is when an event is held for people with cognitive disabilities, whereas unified is a sport that’s recognized by the Alberta Schools’ Athletic Association (ASAA), which is the Alberta athletic association that we follow for all high school teams,” Eagles detailed. “It’s one member of the team, often depending on what sport you’re playing, has an intellectual disability paired up with a partner.”
One example she used was bean bag toss.
“You have two people contributing to the same goal, having as much contribution as the other, and one happens to be a Special Olympics-type athlete, or could be someone with an intellectual disability, and another partner. Instead of having their own separate event, it’s an event where you’re bringing both groups together to work collectively toward the same goal.”
Unified Sports has been at CLHS for three years. They’ve hosted a bean bag toss tournament each year over that time, and recently introduced bocce ball. Last year, two students from CLHS participated in a track and field event where they placed second overall.
The school purchased uniforms for athletes participating in Unified Sports, and added an award, which is presented during their annual athletic banquet.
“They’re included in our pep rallies. They run down and rip through a big piece of paper with their teammates, and they get cheered on like everybody else,” Eagles exclaimed. “We’re just trying to change the culture in our school, so I think that’s what they recognized at the unified awards as well. It’s more than just having a few sports, we’re really trying to incorporate it in all aspects of our school culture.”
Eagles believes offering Unified Sports at their school has inspired other programs, such as Best Buddies.
“It’s an evening once a month where our special needs students and anyone else who would like to come from our school get together, and we do a different event,” Eagles said.
When Eagles and her colleague, Jared Nichols, first heard about Unified Sports, they jumped at the chance to include a demographic of students in a more intentional way when it came to sports.
“Since we started doing it at school, we couldn’t stop. It’s just an amazing event. We’re doing it for them, but trust me, we’re getting more out of this than they probably are. It’s everything we love about sports. All of the sportsmanship, the excitement, and the reason why you played sports when you were a young athlete starting out. You see it in their eyes, it just motivates you and makes you want to keep running events.”
Having the Special Olympics select CLHS as the Unified School of the Year confirmed to Eagles that they’re making a difference.
“It was really nice that someone thought that we were doing a good job. You don’t go into teaching and coaching to get recognized, but to have an organization like the Special Olympics that we respect so much to recognize Cold Lake was pretty amazing,” she expressed.
In the future, Eagles hopes to help expand Unified Sports throughout the area.
She said, “We just want to keep spreading the good word, being advocate for it, and just make to accessible to all schools… Not every school has a large population of people with cognitive disabilities, but that’s no reason not to get involved. It’s not very hard to run, there are resources, there’s help, and once you do it once, trust me, I think you’ll be hooked and keep doing it. You get so much back from it.”
