Youth Unified Sports®:
Young people with and without intellectual disability in school-based sports teams
Martha Jo Braycich
Director, Organizational Development, Foundations &
Public Institutions

Special Olympics Aims
• Create positive public attitudes toward people with intellectual disabilities and
• Integrate people with intellectual disabilities in society
… through sports.

Special Olympics Youth Unified Sports®: Definition
An internationally tested program that combines an equal numbers of youths with intellectual disability
(athletes) and youths without intellectual disability
(partners), aged 12-25, on teams for regular training and competition

Special Olympics Europe Eurasia
Youth Unified Sports: Goals
• Sports as a platform for the integration and personal development of young people with intellectual disability in local communities,
• While giving educators and coaches cost-effective and easy to implement tools to facilitate inclusion,
• And building alliances of various community partners to link special and mainstream environments.

Youth Unified Sports: Framework
• Mainstream and special schools; local clubs
• Classroom-based educational component (SO Get Into It)
• Ability and age grouping
• Consistent training and competition plan
• Meaningful exchanges to reflect on experience

Impact Study on Youth Unified Football Pilot
Project 2005/2006
• In cooperation with University of Massachusetts Boston/Special
Olympics Global Collaborating Center
• Interviews with 735 athletes and partners, aged 15-17, five countries*
• Assess impact on promoting greater understanding and acceptance and facilitating social relationships, as well as sports experience
*Austria, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Slovakia

Partner Gains in Understanding of
People with Intellectual Disabilities
18%
52%
Changed A Lot
Changed A Little
Stayed the Same
30%

Special Olympics Europe/Eurasia
Youth Unified Sports today
• 26,000 participants in 1200 schools in 40 countries in Europe/Eurasia
(2010) including:
• CEE/CIS: 11,000 participants in 500 schools in 11countries
• Mainly Football and Basketball
• Main partners: EU, Vodafone
Foundation, UEFA, FIBA Europe;
Mattel Children’s Foundation

Youth Unified Impact Study 2010 conducted by the University Of Ulster/Belfast
• Evaluate the strengths of Unified Sports as a model for the community integration of young people with intellectual disability
• Document the barriers and facilitators to community integration generally and within particular cultural and social contexts

Youth Unified Impact Study 2010 conducted by the University Of Ulster/Belfast
• Five countries: Serbia, Poland, Ukraine,
Germany and Hungary
• Football and Basketball
• Interviews with 275 participants
• Five universities as partners in the participating countries

Main findings
• Postive personal development in terms of communication and socialization skills, confidence and self esteem.
• For athletes the development of social networks and
connections in the community are largely attributable to participation in Unified Sports.
• Athletes experience how it feels to be valued for their abilities rather than devalued through perceptions of disability.
• Athlete participation has led to employment and educational opportunities .

Youth Unified: challenges and tasks
• Break through traditional ways of thinking
• Gender imbalance among particpants
• Participant retention and transition
• Program expansion
• Attract more institutional partners

One athlete summed up his experience on a Unified team, saying: “We all can play in the same schoolyard and live together in the same world.”

Thank You!
mbraycich@specialolympics.org
www.specialolympics-eu.org

http://www.specialolympicsee.eu/ee_vodap hone-supports-special-olympics.aspx