By Ainsley Hall
INWOOD — A group representing Musselman High School participated in the Special Olympics Unified Champion Schools Summit in Morgantown last week.
A group of teachers, students and family members attended the summit to learn more about how other schools are creating more opportunities to bring together special education students and general education students. The group came home with new ideas and more excitement to create a better and more positive environment for everyone.
Brian Kleppner, a special education teacher, is the Unified Special Olympics liaison at Musselman High School and was one of the teachers who attended the event. One of his main goals for the school is to become a banner school for the program and encourage even more students at Musselman to get involved.
Musselman High School was the only school to bring a group of students to the summit, which included Payton Smith, Addy Mardo and Brendan Dugan.
“Most schools and people see special education students and think that they don’t want to talk with them, because they are different, but when you do, you quickly realize it isn’t any different from talking with other friends,” Mardo said. “We want to help other realize that and bring what we learned during the summit to our school.”
“Most of the time, general education students and special education students are separated,” Smith added. “Unified Special Olympics is all about mixing that up and getting to know other students and just being their friend.”
During the summit, the group members learned about other unified sports, different ways they can promote inclusion in their school and about different schools and their approach to becoming a Unified School. They even had the opportunity to play some games themselves, as Dugan shared this was one of his favorite parts about the event.
“I liked playing cornhole and bocce ball,” Dugan said. “I enjoyed learning about unified sports and inclusion and being a leader in different sports we play.”
Kleppner is excited to see students step up to be leaders in the program and is proud to see how much they’ve grown. He shared that some of the students were asked to talk about their experiences and what they are doing at the school.
“I’ve been teaching special education for 28 years, and it’s just been amazing to see how these kids have embraced this program,” Kleppner said. “They aren’t afraid to speak up, and the way they treat other people is inspiring.”