April 11, 2007
Tatyana McFadden has spent the last two years fighting for inclusion. The 17-year-old Paralympic wheelchair racer wants a chance, she said, to compete like anybody else: alongside able-bodied teammates, with results that count for Atholton High School's track and field team.And now, after so much work, she feels more ostracized than ever before.
What began as a disabled athlete's hopeful journey to break down barriers has evolved into an unsentimental debate about whether all barriers need to be broken down. McFadden considers her equal participation a civil right; many track athletes and coaches consider it an unnecessary threat to the integrity of their sport.
In March, McFadden filed a federal lawsuit demanding that the state of Maryland treat her the same as all athletes at the state track and field championships -- her second lawsuit in a year. In doing so, she has forced Maryland to consider how to best combine wheelchair races and runners, a dilemma that thousands of road races face each year. McFadden's court date has yet to be determined, but Maryland's track community already has rendered its verdict.
Teammates worry about safety while running on the track while McFadden is racing, reaching speeds up to 20 mph. Competitors think Atholton, a public school in Columbia, will dominate meets because of the points the high school junior would earn by racing in a wheelchair division that consists of only herself. On Internet message boards and in private conversations, runners pose various forms of the same question: For McFadden, who won two medals at the 2004 Paralympics in Athens and continues to travel the world to compete, is a spot on the high school track team worth this much tumult?
And to be honest, I don't have an answer to these questions -- and I'm glad I don't have to be the one to answer them. I'm throwing this one out for you folks to discuss -- what do you think?
Posted by: Greg at
10:57 PM
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Instead, the school should assist with the funds for the girl to travel to para-athlete events. And put her accomplishments on the school sports page.
The law doesn't require that all students have an identical experience in high school. If that were true, very low-IQ students would have to be admitted to the gifted and talented or AP classes. All students would have to be able to play on the varsity teams. What the law does, is require that students needing only minimal modifications be given them, to make participation possible.
Too many schools have long laundry lists of accommodations that teachers must follow EVERY DAY. It makes inclusion of special ed students a logistical nightmare. It also changes, often for the worse, the classroom experience of the regular ed students. The class becomes "special ed's little tutoring session" with the other students as bored, disinterested hangers-on.
Posted by: Lfox at Sun Apr 15 00:59:03 2007 (3z/7r)
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