DISABILITY SPORT RESEARCH INITIATIVE
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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:
Status of the Seven Disabled Sports Organizations and Recommendations for the Future
Paper presented as
requirements of Brown University Royce Fellowship. Providence, RI.
Wolff, E.A. (1998)
This report summarizes research on the seven national Disabled Sports Organizations (DSO's) recognized by the United States Olympic Committee (USOC).
These organizations provide sports competition and training opportunities to specific groups of people with disabilities.
The primary goal of this report is to provide the DSO's with feedback from athletes, coaches and administrators as to how they view the positive aspects of these organizations, areas that need improvement, and challenges and barriers facing these organizations.
This report is an exploratory descriptive study of these seven DSO's, based upon interviews with athletes, coaches and administrators within the DSO's themselves, and from the USOC - Committee on Sports for the Disabled (C0SD), and the USOC � Disabled Sports Services (DSS).
The first section of the report provides an overview of the DSO's. The DSO's appear to have large scale and ambitious missions aiming to provide a variety of sports competition and training opportunities for a particular disability group throughout the United States.The report notes that Special Olympics, Inc. (SOI) upholds a less competitive philosophy toward sports competition and training than the other DSO's.
Next, the report looks at how sports opportunities for people with disabilities are provided under a separate structure and separate philosophy from those opportunities provided to people without impairments.
The report notes that the DSO's are established as a segregated sports system within the structure of the USOC and within sports in the United States generally. The media typically presents athletes from the DSO's, not as athletes, but as inspirational and courageous people.
The third section reports on whether or not sports competition for people with disabilities are accepted by the general public as legitimate, i.e., accepted on par with sports for people without impairments. While the DSO's want sports competition and training opportunities for people with disabilities to be viewed as legitimate, it appears that these opportunities for people with disabilities are not integral to the spectrum of sport as it currently exists.Further, all of the DSO's with the exception of SOI lack significant name recognition with the general public.
The report then examines how the DSO's operate, and shape and deliver their services. For all of the DSO's except SOI, there is not enough staff within the organization to effectively deliver sports competition and training opportunities. The DSO's have difficulty getting funding and corporate sponsorship for their organizations. Although sponsors are sometimes willing to come on board for one competition or event, most will not continue as long term sponsors.
Finally, except for SOI, none of the DSO's has a comprehensive system for evaluating their training programs, competitions and organizational structure. The report also examines the extent to which the DSO's are involved in collaborations with each other, with the National Governing Bodies (NGB's) of the various sports, and with the United States Olympic Committee itself. Historically, there have been numerous turf issues among the DSO's, so there has been more competition than collaboration.
In order for collaboration between DSO's and NGB's to be effective, the DSO's recognize that the NGB's and the DSO's will both need to give up some control. Also, it is not clear whether or not the USOC is really working to embrace the DSO's.
The report then advances a series of recommendations concerning the DSO's and concerning sports for people with disabilities. At the outset, it is noted that sports competition and training for people with disabilities are conducted by the DSO's under a disability model rather than a sports model. This means sports for the disabled are framed around disability rather than sport.
The recommendations are intended to assist all of the DSO's in moving toward the sports model, which seems to be the objective that many of the respondents share.
Some of the primary recommendations are:
- Sports for people with disabilities will gain more recognition within a sports framework rather than a disability framework. The term "Disabled Sports Organization" should be redefined as sports organizations for people with disabilities, and the term "disabled sports" could be rephrased as sports for people with disabilities.
- Sports competition and training for people with disabilities should share the same philosophy toward competition as the USOC and the various NGB's, i.e., the win-lose philosophy. This shared philosophy would allow more recognition of athletes with disabilities as competitors in the same way athletes without impairments are defined as competitors.
- To gain more recognition for sports for people with disabilities, a sports movement for people with disabilities should be created. This movement would include all persons and organizations potentially involved in sports for people with impairments.
- Sports for people with disabilities should also establish an evaluation framework, which would encourage research and review of the opportunities that are available to people with impairments.
- To take advantage of the new amendment to the Amateur Sports Act of 1978, the Paralympics should become the overarching body for all sports competition and training opportunities for people with cognitive, sensory and physical disabilities. Further, a role should be defined for the National Paralympic Committee (NPC), which might govern all sports competition and training for people with disabilities.
- To build linkages to sports organizations that primarily provide opportunities to people without impairments, sports for people with disabilities could establish standing committees or ad-hoc committees under the auspices of these various organizations. These committees could be designated to provide policy recommendations regarding the programs, governance and policies and procedures of the organizations.
- Finally, an ongoing and more public dialogue about the issues in sports for people with disabilities needs to be developed, and this dialogue would encourage these sports opportunities to evolve, change and grow.
Report by Eli Wolf:
Northeastern
University's
CENTER FOR THE STUDY OF SPORT IN SOCIETY
716 Columbus Avenue, Suite 161 CP
Boston, MA 02120
Phone: (617) 373-4025
Fax:
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