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It all began with a phone call. Mark Hanken ’93, the vice
president of sports at the Oregon Special Olympics contacted Willamette’s
assistant athletic director for facilities and operations, Ray “Skip”
Kenitzer, with a request. Oregon Special Olympics was hosting its
state basketball tournament in Salem and would Willamette like to
be one of the venues for the games? Kenitzer’s response was,
“Of course, you’re preaching to the choir. We’re
there.”
After the tournament came a second call. This time is was Janet
Capetty, the field director and training director for Oregon Special
Olympics. She was having trouble finding anyone willing to hold
a basketball clinic for her volunteer coaches. She wanted to know
if Willamette was interested. “I thought, oh this has got
to work,” says Kenitzer who knew he could count on Gordie
James, head coach of the Willamette men’s basketball team,
to spearhead the effort. James didn’t disappoint.
After the clinic in January came another phone call from Capetty
in the spring. Again she needed coaches – this time to run
a track and field clinic. Within a half-hour of the call, Kenitzer
had head coach for track and field and cross country, Matt McGuirk,
on board. Once again, the clinic was a success, but Capetty had
one more call to make. This time she wasn’t looking for coaches.
Capetty wanted to talk with Kenitzer in person. At the meeting,
she proposed solidifying the relationship between the two organizations
and making Willamette a permanent training site for Special Olympics
coaches. Kenitzer didn’t need a moment to consider the offer,
“I said, ‘I think it would be great.’”
What began with a few phone calls, and the willingness of some
coaches, has deepened into an exciting new partnership between Oregon
Special Olympics and Willamette. While many details need to be worked
out, Capetty is grateful to have found a collection of coaching
professionals who make time for community service. She says the
hardest part of her job is finding coaches who aren’t just
experts in their sports but also have the interpersonal finesse
to teach others how to coach. “That is what I have found in
spades here at Willamette,” she says. “Great people
who are knowledgeable and who love their sport and are very willing
to share that knowledge.”
Indeed, Willamette seems particularly qualified to provide training
for Special Olympics because so many of its coaches and exercise
science faculty have experience working with special populations.
Kenitzer’s connection with Special Olympics extends back to
his graduate school years at the University of North Colorado. He
has a master’s degree in adaptive physical education, which
specializes in designing physical education for those with disabilities.
For several years he was Northern Colorado’s adaptive program
coordinator, building award-winning programs for local community
organizations. Later, as head swimming coach for Skidmore College,
Kenitzer involved the entire swim team in helping to run Special
Olympics aquatic events.
Kenitzer says when he came to Willamette he found the same community
spirit among the coaching staff. “When I came here I heard
the slogan, ‘Not unto ourselves alone are we born,’
and I thought, ‘well that’s nice,’” says
Kenitzer. “But it’s real. Our coaches are very civic-oriented
and very community oriented.”
Judging by the response to the two clinics, Willamette’s
coaches also flat out know how to teach. Of course, who wouldn’t
want to learn basketball fundamentals from Gordie James, who has
both a national coach of the year award and a national championship
title to his name. James, who does clinics for a variety of groups,
says the secret to effectively teaching the volunteers was approaching
the game from their perspective. “As an educator, I need to
adapt to that person’s skill level. I think one of the things
the Special Olympics volunteers really appreciated was that we didn’t
coach down to them. We coached at their level.”
“We really had to go back to square one and teach from the
ground up,” echoes McGuirk, reflecting on his experiences
with the track and field clinic. Though he and his coaches had just
come back from placing first in the Northwest Conference Championships,
they took time away from their preparation for nationals to put
on the clinic. He says the real praise for the event’s success
belongs to his assistant coaches, who are themselves unpaid and
already volunteer much of their valuable time to Willamette. “It
was a difficult time of year for us, but because of the high quality
people I have on my coaching staff, it went off very well.”
This kind of civic-mindedness, notes Capetty, is especially important
for Oregon Special Olympics because Oregon’s program is almost
entirely volunteer-driven. “Most of our volunteers don’t
have athletic backgrounds. That’s why training is so critical
and I urge anyone with sports experience to volunteer for Special
Olympics. You’re talking about volunteer time of as little
as an hour a week. It’s not a huge commitment, and the rewards
are wonderful.”
There are also, notes Hanken, many opportunities for Willamette
students to benefit from this partnership. Leadership experiences,
career networking and doing something important, are just a few
of the valuable benefits he lists off the top of his head. Hanken
himself is the product of a service learning experience at Willamette.
He interned as a recreational therapist at the Oregon State Hospital
for his class, community psychology. Calling it “one of the
most profound experiences” he’s had, Hanken says Special
Olympics could open the same kinds of avenues for Willamette students
that it did for him. “There are many models for building Special
Olympics into different types of curriculum, from health sciences
and education to psychology and sociology.”
Some students have already benefited from the contact with Special
Olympics. For example, Peter Harmer, professor of exercise science,
included exercise science students in a medical team that he organized
for the basketball tournament. “It was a good experience for
the students,” says Harmer, who also has a specialty in adaptive
physical education and has worked with Special Olympics in the past.
“I think the athletes benefited as well.” This spring,
another group of students from Baxter Hall lead a service learning
project up to Mt. Bachelor, where they volunteer to help with some
of the Special Olympics winter events. “I had complete confidence
the event would go well when I learned we had a Willamette University
group there,” says Hanken.
Between practice, long seasons, the never-ending battle of recruitment,
and all of the energy and commitment it takes to build a winning
collegiate team, Willamette’s coaches had a million different
reasons to say no to Special Olympics Oregon. They didn’t
because they understand that – as cliché as it sounds
– sports is about much more than winning; it’s about
making sure that everyone who wants to play has the chance to compete.
It’s a philosophy best summed up by James. “We were
placed here to be givers, not takers. We want to give as much as
we can to as many as we can. I think that’s more important
that ever in the realm of sports because it tends to get distorted.
I think for a Willamette athlete, it all comes back to what you
can do for others.”
Here’s to a new partnership.
– Brad Millay ’97
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