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Background
After the recent signing of the UN’s landmark Convention on the Protection and Promotion of the Rights and Dignity of People with Disabilities, UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan said, “Today promises to be the dawn of a new era – an era in which disabled people will no longer have to endure the discriminatory practices and attitudes that have been permitted to prevail for all too long.”
There is much work to be done.
As the world’s largest sports organization for people with intellectual disability, serving more than 2.5 million individuals in 160 countries, Special Olympics is strongly placed to bring acceptance, dignity and opportunity to the world’s 190 million people with intellectual disabilities.
For a segment of the population routinely shunned, isolated and stigmatized, Special Olympics has proven to be a powerful mechanism for improving health, building self-esteem, learning skills, and supporting families, as well as being an effective tool for changing public attitudes and promoting local community engagement.
Special Olympics, through quality sports training and competition and related programs, improves the lives of people with intellectual disabilities and, in turn, the lives of everyone they touch. Special Olympics is committed to positively changing attitudes toward people with intellectual disabilities to promote acceptance and inclusion of a population that has been discriminated against and marginalized.
We need to engage youth and adults in school and community-based settings in order to successfully reach more athletes and transform the way people think about individuals with intellectual disabilities. To promote greater understanding and inclusion, Special Olympics seeks to expand its work to inform more citizens about people with intellectual disabilities while seeking their active engagement in meeting the challenge of moving the aspiring Special Olympics athlete from sideline to playing field.
