Leilani Feiertag is an ASU Cronkite School of Journalism student assigned to cover Westwood High School for AZPreps365. 

 

It was the classic story of the high school athlete thinking that they are the best and they are untouchable. A school administrator notices this and wants to teach the athlete about life, give them a lesson, so the administrator convinces the athlete to join a club that wasn’t just about themselves. In the end, the athlete’s eyes are opened and are a better version of themselves. This story is true for Brady Pond, Westwood High School’s Athletic Director. 

“I convinced him to sign up for Unified to see the change in that young man,” Pond said. “I keep using this term serve because it’s mutual, they serve each other.” 

Unity. Diversity. Inclusion. These are the words that describe Unified Sports, a Special Olympics program that combines athletes with and without disabilities on the same sports team. The term “Unified” comes from integrating athletes with and without disabilities. These disabilities can be both intellectual and physical. Every athlete with a disability is paired with a teammate who doesn’t have a disability called “partners.” 

In 2010, the Special Olympics adopted Unified Sports. Unified Sports has been gaining traction and spreading across the state. 

“We’re in 140 schools, and our goal is 250 by 2027,” Jamie Heckerman, President and CEO of Special Olympics Arizona, said. 

One of the schools taking charge at Unified Sports is Westwood High School in Mesa, Arizona. In 2019 Westwood implemented Unified Sports and Pond played a big role in making that possible. There is even a waiting list of students who want to participate in Unified Sports.

“When I became an administrator here at Westwood, I saw that we had a really awesome population of kids with special needs,”  Pond said, “and that they didn’t really have a lot of opportunities for connection with our campus.” 

Pond had this idea long before he started working for the Warriors. When he was originally coaching for the district, he saw other schools implement Unified Sports and the positive outcomes that came with the program. 

“It really helped with their unity and diversity,” he said. “It helped with inclusion." 

Not only does Unified Sports help with bringing people together, it also helps kids break out of their shells. 

A life that Unified Sports touched was Brendan. In 2022, Meg Bowman, head coach for Unified Sports at Westwood, had the opportunity to take an athlete and a partner to Orlando, Florida, for the USA Games. Brendan is non-verbal and wouldn’t look anyone in the eyes when he started Unified. This didn’t last very long for Brendan while is was in Orlando. 

“He came running over, he had the net from the basketball game and his gold medal,” Bowman said with a huge smile on her face as she was recounting the memory. “And he’s like ‘I’ve been looking for you to interview me! I won, I told you I would win, and I won.” 

Unified Sports gave Brendan a voice, and this holds true for many of the other athletes part of Unified. 

Kate Anderson, a partner for Unified Sports at Westwood, said being a part of Unified has been able to make her open-minded. 

“It helps me see people in a different light. Sometimes I would be a little scared, if that makes sense, but now I see them and I want to go up and talk to them because they are the best people ever,” Anderson said. 

Inclusion is what Unified strives for, giving kids a space to feel included and accepted. Bowman reflects on a memory that she had about her daughter, Jane, who is special needs. She comes from a badminton family. Bowman played badminton at Westwood, her sister was state champion for Westwood and her other daughter also played varsity badminton. Jane felt left out, because there wasn’t a badminton team that she could be a part of, until Unified Sports. 

“She started saying, ‘We play badminton,’ and we started to see a change in the way she spoke about herself,” Bowman said. “She spoke about her place in the family, her place at Westwood, and it just gave her this identity.”

The Special Olympics Arizona has now been a part of the Arizona Interscholastic Association (AIA) for about 10 years. Since then, students can now get a letter in Unified Sports and get a letterman’s jacket.

Unified Sports is only going to get more popular, but the community also has a responsibility to make this possible. Heckerman believes there is still a lot of work to do. 

“We have the capacity to serve 180,000 people around the state of Arizona just with a disability,” Heckerman said. “But there’s also so much more room for growth that I would like to see. Get involved, give your time. We rely very heavily on volunteers, about 20,000 a year that support our program because our staff is small. There is only 34 of us.”

In the five years that Unified Sports has been a part of Westwood, the team has already made great accomplishments. The Unified track and field team placed fourth in states last season, and the badminton team finished with silver at states. 

For Pond, this is his passion. 

“When I look at our Unified team over the years, there’s literally been every type of kid from every different background, with any or all types of disabilities,” Pond said. “Everybody is coming together for one common goal, and that is just to include everyone. Let everyone have fun and compete in a sport they love.”