On Sunday, more than 50,000 people from all over the world will lace up for the New York City Marathon. From amateurs to seasoned marathoners, these athletes will test their minds and bodies over 26.2 miles. Emily Glasser, president and CEO of Achilles International, and Francesco Magisano, director for the Achilles New York City Metro Region, join “The Daily Report” to discuss breaking down barriers for athletes with disabilities.
Brothers Griffin McConnell, 21, and Sullivan McConnell, 18, were selected for Team USA alongside three other players from around the country. Both are national masters, making them among the highest-rated chess players with disabilities in the country.
“Chess is the only sport that I know of that there’s only one requirement,” Sullivan said. “You just have to be able to think.”
The tournament is only the second of its kind and is a necessary step toward chess becoming an Olympic sport. It will bring together competitors with a range of disabilities.
“We’re going to be playing against people who are possibly blind,” Sullivan said. “We’ll be playing against people who can’t move their hands, can’t move their feet, and that doesn’t stop them from playing.”
Andy Cross/DP
Griffin (left) and Sullivan (right) have been playing chess from a very young age. (Photo By Andy Cross/The Denver Post)
Though the championship is being held half a world away, daily training happens in Golden.
“We played each other more than any other person,” Griffin said. “We are both very competitive. We’re always trying to figure out who’s the better brother.”
For Sullivan, this trip will be a first.
“It’s been Sullivan’s dream. He’s never been out of the United States. We had to get a passport, like, within two weeks,” their father Kevin McConnell said.
Kevin McConnell
Kevin McConnell (left) is the father of Griffin and Sullivan and the Executive Director of PALS Chess Academy.
Kevin, executive director of PALS Chess Academy, is proud to see his sons get the chance to compete on an international stage.
“I’m just really proud that they get a chance to represent their country, No. 1. And they’re a super strong team,” he said. “It would just be amazing for chess.”
Griffin and Sullivan will play on Boards Two and Four for Team USA. For Griffin, that means not just focusing on his own matches, but helping his brother prepare for opponents.
“We are brothers. Even though I’m lower rated than him, I can still help Sullivan with certain opponents,” Griffin said. “It’s a guessing game, but if I do it correctly, which I have done before, that has helped Sullivan win games.”
The brothers see the sport as a uniquely inclusive competition.
“It is the most accessible game in the world, no matter what you struggle with,” Sullivan said.
The trip isn’t just about games and rankings.
“Doing it with one of my other people, my brother, helping me and coming with me… It’s going to be a memory that I will always have,” Sullivan said.
Kevin said he hopes his sons’ role in the tournament helps advance chess in the global sports arena.
“It would be amazing if my kids were at the forefront of the group effort to make that happen,” he said.
The McConnell brothers depart for Kazakhstan later this month, bringing with them not only their boards and pieces, but also a chance to show that chess can thrive on the world stage — and perhaps, one day, at the Olympics.
Denver7
Denver7 | Your Voice: Get in touch with Colin Riley
Denver7’s Colin Riley is a multimedia journalist who tells stories impacting all of Colorado’s communities, but specializes in reporting on transportation and our state’s senior population. If you’d like to get in touch with Colin, fill out the form below to send him an email.
RTD directors faced a barrage of public opposition and were locked in debate Tuesday night over how to restructure the agency’s Access-on-Demand service, which provides free rides to people with disabilities on commercial services such as Uber and Lyft.
The directors were wrestling with a staff proposal to impose a base fare of $6.50, reduce the maximum per-ride subsidy from $25 to $20 for up to 60 rides per month, and end the 24/7 availability across the Regional Transportation District’s 2,342-mile service area. They voted 10-5 to set the base fare at $4.50, but had yet to agree on other changes at 9:30 p.m.
For more than a year, RTD’s 15 elected directors have been unable to decide on the changes that Chief Executive and General Manager Debra Johnson recommended to make Access-on-Demand “financially viable.”
On Tuesday night, they heard more than three hours of appeals by metro Denver residents with disabilities who urged RTD to maintain a service they described as a lifeline.
A transit fare of $6.50 “may not sound like much to you. But it would make it so that I cannot afford to go to work,” Gabby Gonzales, who works part-time at a pizza restaurant and estimated her monthly income at about $1,100. “Please keep it as it is. Make it affordable for me.”
It’s a matter of “freedom,” said Molly Kirkham, who told directors Access-on-Demand “changed my life,” enabling her to live independently and work. “We want to be in the community.”
State Sen. Faith Winter referred directors to a letter signed by 30 lawmakers opposed to the changes that she said “will harm our community.” And James Flattum, spokesman for the grassroots advocacy group Greater Denver Transit, said doing the right thing means preserving the service as is. “Please do not raise fares for our disabled neighbors in this community,” he said.
RTD directors also were considering whether to order a new study of transit for people with disabilities in metro Denver encompassing Access-on-Demand and the separate, legally required Access-a-Ride service that demands day-before reservations for shared mini-bus rides with a standard fare of $4.50. A “peer review” of Access-on-Demand by national public transportation officials that RTD chief Johnson commissioned last year concluded RTD should restructure the program to ensure “financial sustainability.” Access-on-Demand costs about $17 million out of the RTD’s $1.2 billion annual budget.
The monthly ridership using Access-on-Demand reached 73,000 in July, according to RTD records. That’s more than 10 times the ridership when agency directors launched Access-on-Demand five years ago.
Earlier this month, Rinearson was recognized with a humanitarian award for her work employing people with disabilities at Jake’s Ice Cream and Jake’s Gourmet Popcorn shops in Falls Church, Virginia.
A customer orders at Jake’s Gourmet Popcorn in Falls Church, Virginia. (WTOP/Scott Gelman)
A customer orders at Jake’s Gourmet Popcorn in Falls Church, Virginia. (WTOP/Scott Gelman)
Robin Rinearson spent decades as a pediatric eye doctor, but became frustrated when her nephew was sent home from work during the pandemic.
He has cerebral palsy and had been working for a company in Lorton, Virginia, for eight years. It wasn’t able to make accommodations for the adults with disabilities that had been working there.
So, Jake became unemployed and bored. He didn’t have a big group of friends, and work was a major part of his social life.
The experience prompted Rinearson, who worked with special needs adults in her Northern Virginia practice, to open Jake’s Ice Cream in 2021. The shop provided job opportunities for people with disabilities, and she expanded that vision in 2023 when she opened Jake’s Gourmet Popcorn in Seven Corners Center in Falls Church, Virginia.
Earlier this month, Rinearson was recognized with the humanitarian award from her alma mater, the Illinois College of Optometry. The honor is typically given to graduates who have done charitable acts, usually vision care, in poorer countries, Rinearson said. But this year, she was selected.
“In my retirement, I have spent my own money to open up both of these shops,” Rinearson said. “I am an unpaid employee in both shops. I am dedicated to improving the lives of people with disabilities.”
The ice cream shop opened during the pandemic, and while business wasn’t booming, Rinearson said it picked up enough in the second year that she considered a second location.
She found the storefront for Jake’s Gourmet Popcorn with double the space for the same cost in rent. But a non-compete in her original lease prevented her from opening another nearby without an increase in rent.
While in Chicago for a meeting, Rinearson wandered downtown. She remembered there’s a popcorn shop every three blocks, but there aren’t many in the D.C. region. That inspired her to launch her own, with the same vision of creating jobs for staff members with disabilities.
It all started with 120 gallons of popcorn
What started with a catering order of 120 gallons of popcorn for an event at the National Museum for the American Indian has evolved into a shop that now caters for corporate events. It only gets about 10 to 15 walk-in customers each day, she said. But they make hundreds of bags of popcorn for large companies.
The shop offers over 30 flavors of popcorn and makes two kinds. One is butterfly popcorn, similar to the type made in home microwaves. The other is mushroom popcorn, named for its larger shape and density.
Staff members carefully follow recipes and checklists, making sure the shop remains sensitive to customers with allergies or other restrictions.
“My piece of this is making sure that everybody in the community around us understands that they’re just regular people,” Rinearson said. “They want the same things you and I do.”
Mesha O’Dell, who was working at the popcorn shop Tuesday, said the space “provides a place for me to work. Me being an adult that has vision impairment, because it can oftentimes be difficult for someone with a disability to find jobs.”
Debbie Garrett, meanwhile, said she enjoys working at the store, “and I like the popcorn and I like working with Robin.”
A steep learning curve that pays off
At both stores, Rinearson said the employees are excited to be at work and don’t make excuses to avoid a shift. There could be a steep learning curve, she said, but they’re dependable once they learn a new skill.
And both shops are evolving. At Jake’s Ice Cream, employees have started making cookies and ice cream cakes and pies. The flavors are premium, made with ingredients from Baltimore.
Ice cream and popcorn flavors change seasonally, and to support community fundraisers, the shops offer events where the winner can create their own ice cream or popcorn flavor.
Some people are curious to visit once they learn the shops primarily employ people with disabilities, “but they’re expecting things to be less than wonderful. You get the pity vote or the curiosity visit. If your product isn’t premium, those people aren’t coming back,” Rinearson said.
Many of the store employees are taking college classes and earning their driver’s licenses, she added.
“They might be a little bit more difficult to understand when they speak,” Rinearson said. “They might walk a little bit more slowly, but there’s no family that will not be touched by disability at some point, whether you’re born with it, whether it’s a function of an injury or a surgical procedure, whether you’re elderly and starting to fall apart at some point — every single family is touched with somebody in their family with a disability. When it’s your own family, you don’t tend to walk away from those people.”
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Almost one-third of the budget cuts and sweeps of unused money that Gov. Jared Polis used to close a $249 million budget hole will come from Medicaid, and providers are trying to figure out how much disruption that will cause for them and their patients.
About $79.2 million of the $252 million in cuts came from the Colorado Department of Health Care Policy and Financing, which runs Medicaid in the state. The list includes a mix of reductions in the rates paid to people who provide care, unused funds swept from specific programs and plans to review some care types more strictly before paying.
The largest cut, worth roughly $38.3 million, would roll back most of a 1.6% increase that most providers expected to get this year. Since providers received slightly higher rates in the first months of the fiscal year, it will work out to about a 0.4% increase, which is in line with recent years, the department said.
Denver Health estimated the rollback would cost the city’s safety-net hospital about $5 million. The health system isn’t planning any layoffs or service reductions, but could cut back on nonessential maintenance and technology updates, CEO Donna Lynne said. As it was, the increase only partially offset growth in costs in recent years, she said.
“We were already trying to absorb the difference between medical inflation and the 1.6%,” she said. The American Hospital Association estimated hospital costs rose about 5.1% in 2024.
The Colorado Hospital Association said its members were “disappointed” with the rollback, especially since they expect to lose Medicaid funding under provisions of H.R. 1 in 2027 and beyond. An unknown number of patients will lose Medicaid coverage due to new work requirements, and states won’t be able to draw down as much federal funding for hospitals because of limits on provider taxes.
“We recognize the tough choices required in this budget process, but reductions to provider rates — particularly alongside other health care cuts stemming from H.R. 1 — add to the challenges ahead,” the association said in a statement. “CHA and our members remain committed to working with the governor and legislators to identify solutions that protect health care funding and sustain access to care across Colorado.”
Dentists also will receive less for treating Medicaid patients than they anticipated, with about $2.5 million in reductions to planned increases. The Colorado Dental Association said it was waiting for details about which services would take cuts, and how deep they would go.
Other Medicaid cuts include:
$7 million from reviewing applied behavior analysis claims for improper billing. The therapy attempts to teach daily living skills to people with severe autism.
$6.1 million from requiring prior authorization for more than 24 psychotherapy visits in one year
$5.6 million that Colorado was going to spend to keep children covered by Medicaid until age 3. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services revoked permission for the state to do that.
$4.4 million from a fund to raise pay in nursing homes above $15 per hour. The state’s minimum wage will be over $15 next year, making the fund largely irrelevant.
$3 million from reducing the “community connector” benefit to bring kids with disabilities into integrated settings
$3 million from reducing incentives for behavioral health care improvements
$2.7 million from benchmarking the state’s rate for applied behavior analysis for autism to 95% of the rate in comparable states
$1.7 million from requiring prior authorization to administer 17 or more drug tests to the same person in one year
$1.5 million from starting payments to small, rural and pediatric providers in January 2026 instead of July 2025
$1.5 million from reducing the rate paid to family caregivers for people with disabilities
$750,000 from reducing incentives to coordinate primary care
$500,000 in unused funding appropriated for family planning services to undocumented people
$500,000 from training for providers about screening patients for substance misuse and referring them to treatment
$131,000 in funding to advertise Cover All Coloradans, which offers Medicaid-like coverage to undocumented people
The Justice Department is suing Uber, accusing it of allegedly discriminating against passengers with disabilities. The rideshare company denies the claims. Ryan Honick, who is named in the lawsuit, joins CBS News to discuss his experience.
Approximately 1 in 5 children in the United States are estimated to be neurodivergent, representing a spectrum of learning and thinking differences such as autism, ADHD, dyslexia, and more. These children experience the world in unique and valuable ways, but too often, our education systems fail to recognize or nurture their potential. In an already challenging educational landscape, where studies show a growing lack of school readiness nationwide, it is more important than ever to ensure that neurodivergent young learners receive the resources and support they need to succeed.
Early support and intervention
As President and CEO of Collaborative for Children, I have personally seen the impact that high-quality early childhood education can have on a child’s trajectory. Birth to age five is the most critical window for brain development, laying the foundation for lifelong learning, behavior, and health. However, many children are entering their academic years without the basic skills needed to flourish. For neurodivergent children, who often need tailored approaches to learning, the gap is even wider.
Research indicates that early intervention, initiated within the first three years of life, can significantly enhance outcomes for neurodivergent children. Children who receive individualized support are more likely to develop stronger language, problem-solving, and social skills. These gains not only help in the classroom but can also lead to higher self-confidence, better relationships and improved well-being into adulthood.
The Collaborative for Children difference
Collaborative for Children in Houston focuses on early childhood education and is committed to creating inclusive environments where all children can thrive. In Houston, we have established 125 Centers of Excellence within our early childhood learning network. The Centers of Excellence program helps child care providers deliver high-quality early education that prepares children for kindergarten and beyond. Unlike drop-in daycare, our certified early childhood education model focuses on long-term development, combining research-backed curriculum, business support and family engagement.
This year, we are expanding our efforts by providing enhanced training to center staff and classroom teachers, equipping them with effective strategies to support neurodivergent learners. These efforts will focus on implementing practical, evidence-based approaches that make a real difference.
Actionable strategies
As educators and leaders, we need to reimagine how learning environments are designed and delivered. Among the most effective actionable strategies are:
Creating sensory-friendly classrooms that reduce environmental stressors like noise, lighting, and clutter to help children stay calm and focused.
Offering flexible learning formats to meet a range of communication, motor, and cognitive styles, including visual aids, movement-based activities, and assistive technology.
Training teachers to recognize and respond to diverse behaviors with empathy and without stigma, so that what is often misinterpreted as “disruption” is instead seen as a signal of unmet needs.
Partnering with families to create support plans tailored to each child’s strengths and challenges to ensure continuity between home and classroom.
Incorporating play-based learning that promotes executive functioning, creativity, and social-emotional development, especially for children who struggle in more traditional formats.
Benefits of inclusive early education
Investing in inclusive, high-quality early education has meaningful benefits not only for neurodivergent children, but for other students, educators, families and the broader community. Research indicates that neurotypical students who learn alongside neurodivergent peers develop critical social-emotional skills such as patience, compassion and acceptance. Training in inclusive practices can help educators gain the confidence and tools needed to effectively support a wide range of learning styles and behaviors as well as foster a more responsive learning environment.
Prioritizing inclusive early education can also create strong bonds between families and schools. These partnerships empower caregivers to play an active role in their child’s development, helping them navigate challenges and access critical resources early on. Having this type of support can be transformative for families by reducing feelings of isolation and reinforcing that their child is seen, valued, and supported.
The benefits of inclusive early education extend far beyond the classroom. When neurodivergent children receive the support they need early in life, it lays the groundwork for increased workforce readiness. Long-term economic gains can include higher employment rates and greater earning potential for individuals.
Early childhood education must evolve to meet the needs of neurodivergent learners. We cannot afford to overlook the importance of early intervention and tailored learning environments. If we are serious about improving outcomes for all children, we must act now and commit to inclusivity as a core pillar of our approach. When we support all children early, everyone benefits.
Dr. Melanie Johnson, Collaborative for Children
Dr. Melanie Johnson serves as the President and CEO of Collaborative for Children, where she leads groundbreaking initiatives in early learning enterprise systems across Texas’s Gulf Coast region. Her work focuses on improving school-readiness outcomes for under-resourced children from birth to age five through metrics-driven outcomes and digital transformation.
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The rides are held at a Maple Plain farm, where WCCO caught 7-year-old Daisy Spike getting ready to ride a pink-saddled horse named Cole.
The casual ride comes with serious benefits, according to the girl’s mother, Mary Hurley. She says the farm and program have changed every part of her daughter’s life.
“‘Breathe in, breathe out.’ And she does that every single day,” she said. “Lately she hasn’t been liking her seizure medicine, and she does that every day.”
Spike uses those breathing techniques as she rides. Natalie Cerchio, Spike’s occupational therapist with We Can Ride, praises the young girl’s progress, noting that Spike can now ride backwards, while singing and blowing bubbles, to boot.
“She is more able to adjust to the movement of the horse and the changes in the environment in a positive way that she feels confident and capable,” she said. “Trying to make one hand work over the other is coordinating both sides of the brain. You are trying to visually, you are working on motor patterns. All of these skills are necessary for handwriting.”
We Can Ride has been operating for 43 years now. Client fees cover only 33% of operating costs, so they mostly rely on donations. They also accept volunteers to help care for the horses.
We Can Ride is holding a 5K Saturday at Lake Rebecca Park near Delano.
Susan-Elizabeth Littlefield loves sharing the good news. She hosts a show on Sunday mornings based on local “positivity and empowerment,” leading right into CBS Sunday Morning.
A program in Prince George’s County, Maryland, provides mental health services to those already facing big intellectual challenges.
Anjolene Smack-Whaley’s son can struggle to control his anger and his emotions, which is understandable since the 24-year-old is on the autism spectrum.
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Unique program provides mental health services to those who can’t express themselves well
But it’s not any less difficult for her to have to deal with.
“He would make a facial expression. He would talk really loud,” she said. “He would also threaten, ‘I’m going to do this. I’m going to do that.’ He’ll run outside… running down the street.”
He also works, which means dealing with people who might have different personalities, which sometimes don’t always help situations.
“When he has problems, especially with dealing with people, especially with the job, it was stressing me out,” said Smack-Whaley, who lives in Bowie.
But about a year ago, she started getting her son mental health treatment as part of what’s known as Project LIVE (Living with Intention, Vision and Empowerment) through The ARC of Prince George’s County.
“If I didn’t have it? Ooh, I don’t know. I don’t know,” she said. “I just can’t imagine. It’s just been such a blessing to me and my family with him in this program, because I see a difference in him.”
Sometimes the mental health challenge might just be anger or frustration, but the loss of a parent or other traumatic experiences can cause the same sorts of mental health challenges that anyone else might deal with when things upend our lives.
Project LIVE helps with extra challenges
For most people, an unwillingness to express their feelings isn’t the same as being unable to. For those in Project LIVE, that inability is an extra challenge that needs to be addressed.
“We found that three and five youth and young adults with intellectual and developmental disabilities have a co-occurring mental health condition,” said Dreu Lindsay, the project coordinator with The ARC of Prince George’s County. “Youth and young adults between this age group are not comfortable with going to a therapist or there’s barriers or stigma related to it.”
The program aims to bridge all of those gaps, or plow through those barriers.
“There’s this idea that when you have an intellectual and/or developmental disability, a lot of the behaviors that present are related to that disability and not that the behavior could be a presentation of something else going on, like depression or being suicidal or isolation,” said Lindsay.
“Sometimes they’re not able to express it, which is part of what leads to the misunderstanding, because they’re not able to say, ‘I’m feeling this way,’” she added.
But even when correctly diagnosed, the treatment that’s offered will often have to have a different approach. And finding someone willing to provide it can be a challenge too.
“A lot of mental health therapists would not are not so comfortable or feel knowledgeable supporting people with intellectual and developmental disabilities, because they cannot approach it in the same way as someone who is neurotypical,” Lindsay said. “So the approach to treating them or even building rapport may take a lot longer for them to even get comfortable and open up.
“When we first started out, we would do kind of more of an office setting. They (the patient) would come in and have therapy in an office setting, but our therapist quickly learned that they’re not comfortable coming to the office, so what she does is meet them in the community,” Lindsay said.
“So therapy looks like walking around the track. It may be going to a local park and sitting at a bench like anywhere that’s comfortable for the student. It’s really more meeting them where they are, getting them comfortable in their element.”
The training and approach is unique
Most of the young adults they work with, who are between 16 and 25 years old, have autism, though sometimes it might be someone with Down syndrome or another disability.
The grant that helps fund Project LIVE also helps provide training to other therapists willing to lighten the load carried by the therapist working with The Arc. Nationwide, there are very few programs similar to what Project LIVE does.
“They can participate in talk therapy,” Lindsay said. “We are seeing differences made. We have families coming to us thanking us for our services.”
That includes Smack-Whaley, who said her son looks forward to his therapy sessions, which are done virtually at her house.
“He looks forward to when she schedules appointments. He makes sure he gets on for his appointments,” she said.
“It makes me feel good. It really does,” she said, adding it’s now one less thing she has to worry about while parenting a special needs child. “Because now I don’t have to worry about him. He’s learning how to deal with people and and their personalities, because he has these coping skills.”
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Getting around town can be tough for some, but a new transportation option is looking to ease the burden for people with disabilities in the Twin Cities metro.
The Premium on Demand program (POD) is designed to help people like Prince Cole maintain an active lifestyle.
“It’s what I use to get around to my daily activities, appointments, to socialize and to do communtiy engagement,” Cole said.
Polio confined Cole to a wheelchair since he was a young man in West Africa. Traditionally, he has relied on Metro Mobility.
“Metro Mobility don’t come the same day. You have to book it for another day, so that’s the reason I would miss some of my appointments,” he said.
UZURV has been contracted by the Met Council to be a POD program provider.
“We’ve seen a lot of increased interest as people have gotten used to Uber and Lyft,” Andy Streasick, the assistant director of Metropolitan Transportation Services, said.
But those services can’t accommodate many from the disabled community. Cost is also a benefit for the added service.
“The customer is responsible for the first $5 and then Metro Mobility pays the next $20,” Streasick said. “Anything over that, the customer is responsible.”
It’s an expanded freedom of choice for Cole’s transportation needs.
“The company will allow me to be more independent,” he said.
Metro Mobility riders can book rides with UZURV right now. For more information, click here.
In previous years, the committee recommended updated COVID-19 vaccines within days of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approving them. This year, the committee doesn’t have any meetings scheduled until late September, and may not recommend the shot when it does meet, since Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr. appointed multiple members with anti-vaccine views after removing all prior appointees in June.
The lack of a recommendation also means that insurance companies aren’t legally required to pay for the COVID-19 vaccine without out-of-pocket costs. Most private insurers will cover the updated shots this year, though that could change in 2026, according to Reuters.
Initially, CVS said it couldn’t give the COVID-19 vaccine to anyone in Colorado or 15 other states, because of their ACIP-approval requirement. As of Friday morning, its pharmacies can offer the shots to eligible people who have a prescription, spokeswoman Amy Thibault said.
As of about 10 a.m. Friday, CVS’s website wouldn’t allow visitors to schedule COVID-19 shots in Colorado.
Walgreens didn’t respond to questions about its COVID-19 vaccine policy, but its website said patients need a prescription in Colorado. A New York Times reporter found the same in 15 other states.
History of stroke or disease in the brain’s blood vessels
Chronic kidney disease
Liver disease
Cystic fibrosis
Diabetes (all types)
Developmental disabilities, such as Down syndrome
Heart problems
Mental health conditions, including depression and schizophrenia
Dementia
Parkinson’s disease
Obesity
Physical inactivity
Current or recent pregnancy
Diseases or medications that impair the immune system
Smoking
Healthy people technically still can get the vaccine, but would have to ask a health care provider to prescribe it off-label. An off-label prescription refers to one given for a condition the drug isn’t approved to treat, such as a blood-pressure drug prescribed to prevent migraines.
Not everyone has a regular health care provider or the inclination to take time out of their day for an office visit, though. Insurers also vary in their willingness to cover off-label prescriptions.
In September 2022, U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson claimed he was leaving office with “unemployment…down to lows not seen since I was about 10 years old and bouncing around on a space hopper.” In reality, the number of people who were economically inactive had risen by almost 400,000, and an enormous rise in the number of people claiming long-term sickness benefits was already underway.
How did Johnson get away with claiming unemployment was exceptionally low? Government unemployment statistics only look at those who are actively looking for work. If someone is studying, a caregiver, or categorized as long-term sick, they are classed as “economically inactive” and are not counted as unemployed.
In the United Kingdom, one-quarter of the working-age population is currently out of work. (For comparison, in the United States, a similar statistic finds that only 16.6 percent of people in prime working ages are out of the labor force.) Once someone becomes economically inactive due to health reasons, their chances of ever reentering employment within a year drop to 3.8 percent. Up to 3,000 new people per day are writing off work and being approved for sickness benefits, now totaling around 4 million people.
These are Britain’s invisible people.
According to a survey published in 2024, a quarter of all Britons say they are disabled. The Department for Work and Pensions says that’s a 40 percent increase in the past decade.
The real surprise is the tens of thousands of young people who are now economically inactive due to long-term sickness. A National Health Service (NHS) Confederation report showed that in 2021–22, over 63,000 people went straight from studying to being economically inactive due to long-term sickness. In 2002, mental and behavioral problems were the main condition for 25 percent of claimants. In 2024, that figure rose to 44 percent. More than half of the rise in disability claims since 2019 was due to mental health or behavioral conditions, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
What is going on?
About 69 percent of those who apply for sickness benefits mention depression, anxiety, or some other kind of mental or behavioral disorder. Mental illness is now being cited by 48 percent of disabled working Brits, making mental health the single biggest problem. Mental illness, quite clearly, is responsible for a large portion of the spike in claimants.
According to data collected by the TaxPayers’ Alliance, a total of 1.75 million people in England received enhanced personal independence payments (PIP) in April 2025, an increase from 734,136 in January 2019. PIP is just one of many types of social security available to working-age claimants, intended to help them deal with the extra costs of disability. It is available to those in work. However, only one-sixth of PIP recipients are working. Some are receiving these benefits for seemingly minor ailments, including acne, constipation, obesity, “old age,” irritable bowel syndrome, writer’s cramp, and food intolerances. (Thirteen people received PIP for factitious disorders in April.) The largest increases, though, were for mental health disorders. In 2019, the number of PIP claimants for autism was 26,256, and by April 2025, this number had jumped to 114,211. For anxiety and depression, it went from 23,647 in 2019, to 110,075 in April 2025. For ADHD, in the same period, it went from 4,233 to 37,339.
As ludicrous as this sounds, approximately 80 percent of PIP claimants are not in work at all. A person getting incapacity benefits and PIP could be getting 23,899 pounds (roughly $32,250), which is already more than the minimum wage. Someone with children is entitled to even more. When PIP is combined with housing benefits, universal credit, and other offerings, someone could be entitled to 27,354 pounds (roughly $37,000) without paying taxes.
Many of these people may well suffer from mental health conditions that make work a struggle. However, in economic terms, the incentives are entirely off. If you can earn more by claiming benefits than you can working, why would you try to work?
These are real people with real potential. Amy from Keighley is 30, looks after her 8-year-old son, and gets long-term sickness benefits. “I do suffer with mental health issues…[complex post-traumatic stress disorder], anxiety, and depression, and things like that,” she said in the documentary Britain’s Benefits Scandal. She has never held a full-time job. She expressed a desire to work but said she’s trapped by the system. “If I went and got a job tomorrow, everything I get would stop from today. Which would then mean that my rent, everything would stop….Where does that leave my 8-year-old?” She said that after taxes, she would need to earn 35,000 pounds ($47,292) a year to replicate the package she is on now.
People like Amy are simply making economic decisions. Would anyone be reasonably expected to risk swapping the security of welfare dependency for the uncertainty of low-paid work in the private sector?
This is the welfare trap.
It has left Britain in a situation where taxpayers are footing the bill for over 120 billion pounds a year on working-age benefits alone. This is financially unsustainable—not to mention immoral to expect the rest of society to bear the brunt of these costs.
It is also a tragic waste of human potential. These are people that the state has consigned to a lifetime of worklessness. Where is the evidence that, for those with poor mental health, the best thing for them is to be told to stay at home and never work? Work gives people dignity, structure, and a reason to get out of bed in the morning.
Well-intentioned politicians have failed. This year, the Labour Party government tried to make minor cuts to PIP and faced an enormous rebellion from within the party, resulting in a U-turn. It is a welfare policy crisis, a big government crisis, and a warning to the rest of the world that well-intentioned “generous” welfare benefits can inadvertently end up wasting so many people’s lives.
In the U.S., this is increasingly becoming the case. The American welfare system is costing well over $1.2 trillion a year, according to the Congressional Budget Office, encompassing more than 80 federal programs. The system discourages beneficiaries from seeking work. In 1979, American families living below the poverty line earned about 60 percent of their income from work. In 2021, that number had dropped to an all-time low of around 25 percent. Pandemic-era benefits and increased eligibility accelerated these trends. The increased size of the social “safety net” created a cycle of dependency, trapping people in poverty.
Almost half of the American population lives in a household where at least one person receives some form of government benefit. The increasing size of the welfare state, just as in Britain, is creating a culture of dependency.
There is nothing compassionate about a system that wastes millions of lives. Britain’s sickness is a warning to the world. When the state pays people to give up on themselves, many will. For people to flourish, they must not be told they are too broken to work; they should be told they are capable of so much more.
The Kind Mind Co.™ aims to bring accessibility back into the act of creativity, breaking down barriers for those with physical impairments or disabilities. The debut collection includes a range of tools with unique design elements—such as T-shaped grips, varied size multi-directional handles, extending tool holders and more. With adjustable positioning and straps, lightweight materials and CVI friendly-high visibility colors—every tool is crafted to expand access to making art.
MORRISVILLE, Pa., December 12, 2024 (Newswire.com)
– The Kind Mind Co.™ is officially launching this December with a mission to make art accessible for everyone. A new initiative from WeVeel®, the new product line is focused on creating adaptive art tools for individuals of all motor skill and developmental abilities.
“We believe that everyone has the right to express themselves,” says Amy Houser-Curley, Global Creative Director at WeVeel®. “We’ve consulted with educational experts, artists, and the education community to design tools that meet real needs. Being mission-driven is at the heart of how we create.”
Part of the WeVeel® family, which includes kids brands like Scentos® and Yay Hooray!™, The Kind Mind Co.™ benefits from over 15 years of design expertise and industry leadership. The new brand also proudly give back to The Bridge School, a special education institution founded by musicians Neil and Pegi Young, Jim Forderer and educational expert Marilyn Buzolich. The Bridge School’s staff provided critical insights during the design process to ensure the products are effective for students and educators.
“At WeVeel, our mission is to spark joy for everyone, and that’s why we’re committed to serving underserved communities,” says Jessica Kubinski, Chief Marketing and Product Officer at WeVeel®. “Creativity is better when it’s inclusive. We want to make sure every person, regardless of ability, can experience the fun, freedom, and confidence that comes with self-expression.”
The launch of The Kind Mind Co.™ was inspired by a conversation between lifelong friends Valerie Marderosian, CEO of WeVeel®, and Bridge School board member Paula Blomquist. They discovered a need for adaptive tools when teachers and parents were using makeshift solutions like tape and plumbing equipment to help students engage with art successfully.
“California holds a special place in my heart,” says Marderosian. “Working with Paula has been incredibly rewarding, and I’m thrilled to see our partnership with The Bridge School lead to meaningful change. We’re excited to be at the forefront of adaptive art tools that can make a difference in people’s lives.”
Paula Blomquist adds, “At The Bridge School, we have been so fortunate to work with some of the best Occupational Therapists and Assistive Technologists. It’s now a dream come true to know that, through WeVeel, their expertise and creativity will reach children worldwide.”
The Kind Mind Co.™ launched on Black Friday (November 29, 2024) and is available on their website, thekindmind.co, on Amazon and through educational distributors School Health and Nasco. Educators, parents, and artists can explore the collection, watch product demonstrations, and join the movement for better access to creative expression for everyone.
ADAIR, Iowa — The blue-and-white highway sign for the eastbound rest stop near here displays more than the standard icon of a person in a wheelchair, indicating facilities are accessible to people who can’t walk. The sign also shows a person standing behind a horizontal rectangle, preparing to perform a task.
The second icon signals that this rest area along Interstate 80 in western Iowa has a bathroom equipped with a full-size changing table, making it an oasis for adults and older children who use diapers because of disabilities.
“It’s a beacon of hope,” said Nancy Baker Curtis, whose 9-year-old son, Charlie, has a disability that can leave him incontinent. “I’m like, ‘Oh my gosh, we’re finally there.’”
The white changing table is 6 feet long and can be lowered and raised with a handheld controller wired to an electric motor. When not in use, the table folds up against the wall.
The table was recently installed as part of a national effort to make public bathrooms more accessible in places like airports, parks, arenas and gas stations. Without such options, people with disabilities often wind up being changed on bathroom floors, in cars, or even on the ground outside.
Many families hesitate to go out because of the lack of accessible restrooms.
“We all know somebody who’s tethered to their home by bathroom needs,” Baker Curtis said. She doesn’t want her son’s life to be limited that way. “Charlie deserves to be out in the community.”
A sign outside a bathroom at a rest stop near Pacific Junction, Iowa, designating the presence of an adult-size changing table. Photo by Jenny Pohl.She said the need can be particularly acute when people are traveling in rural areas, where bathroom options are sparse.
Baker Curtis, who lives near Des Moines, leads the Iowa chapter of a national group called “Changing Spaces,” which advocates for adult-size changing tables. The group offers an online map showing scores of locations where they’ve been installed.
Advocates say such tables are not explicitly required by the federal Americans with Disabilities Act. But a new federal law will mandate them in many airports in coming years, and states can adopt building codes that call for them.
California, for example, requires them in new or renovated auditoriums, arenas, amusement parks and similar facilities with capacities of at least 2,500 people. Ohio requires them in some settings, including large public facilities and highway rest stops. Arizona, Illinois, Maryland, Minnesota and New Hampshire also have taken steps to require them in some public buildings.
Justin Boatner of Arlington, Virginia, advocates for more full-size changing tables in the Washington, D.C., area. Boatner, 26, uses a wheelchair because of a disability similar to muscular dystrophy. He uses diapers, which he often changes himself.
He can lower an adjustable changing table to the height of his wheelchair, then pull himself onto it. Doing that is much easier and more hygienic than getting down on the floor, changing himself, and then crawling back into the wheelchair, he said.
Boatner said it’s important to talk about incontinence, even though it can be embarrassing. “There’s so much stigma around it,” he said.
He said adult changing tables are still scarce, including in health care facilities, but he’s optimistic that more will be installed. Without them, he sometimes delays changing his diaper for hours until he can get home. That has led to serious rashes, he said. “It’s extremely uncomfortable.”
Iowa legislators in recent years have considered requiring adult changing tables in some public restrooms. They declined to pass such a bill, but the discussion made Iowa Department of Transportation leaders aware of the problem.
“I’m sorry to say, it was one of those things we’d just never thought of,” said Michael Kennerly, director of the department’s design bureau.
A rest stop along Interstate 80 near Adair, Iowa, was one of the state’s first with an adult-size changing table. Without such tables, many travelers who wear diapers wind up being changed on bathroom floors, in cars, or even on the ground. (Tony Leys/KFF Health News)Kennerly oversees planning for rest stops. He recalls an Iowan telling him about changing a family member outside in the rain, with only an umbrella for shelter. Others told him how they changed their loved ones on bathroom floors.
“It was just appalling,” he said.
Iowa began installing adult changing tables in rest stops in 2022, and it has committed to including them in new or remodeled facilities. So far, nine have been installed or are in the process of being added. Nine others are planned, with more to come, Kennerly said. Iowa has 38 rest areas equipped with bathrooms.
Kennerly estimated it costs up to $14,000 to remodel an existing rest-stop bathroom to include a height-adjustable adult changing table. Incorporating adult changing tables into a new rest stop building should cost less than that, he said.
Several organizations offer portable changing tables that can be set up at public events. Some are included in mobile, accessible bathrooms carried on trailers or trucks. Most permanent adult changing tables are set up in “family restrooms,” which have one toilet and are open to people of any gender.
That’s good, because the act of changing an adult is “very intimate and private,” Baker Curtis said. It’s also important for the tables to be height-adjustable because it’s difficult to lift an adult onto a fixed-height table, she said.
Advocates hope adult changing tables will become nearly as common as infant changing tables, which once were rare in public bathrooms.
Jennifer Corcoran, who lives near Dayton, Ohio, has been advocating for adult changing tables for a decade and has seen interest rise in recent years.
The adult-size changing table at a rest stop near Adair, Iowa, is 6 feet long and 32 inches wide. It can be raised and lowered and has a guardrail and safety strap to keep people from rolling off. It folds up to save space. (Tony Leys/KFF Health News)Corcoran’s 24-year-old son, Matthew, was born with brain development issues. He uses a wheelchair and is unable to speak, but he accompanies her when she lobbies for improved services.
Corcoran said Ohio leaders this year designated $4.4 million in federal pandemic relief money to be distributed as grants for changing-table projects. The program has led to installations at Dayton’s airport and art museum, plus libraries and entertainment venues, she said.
Ohio also is adding adult changing tables to rest stops. Corcoran said those tables are priceless because they make it easier for people with disabilities to travel.
“Matthew hasn’t been on a vacation outside of Ohio for more than five years,” she said.
Kaylan Dunlap serves on a committee that has worked to add changing-table requirements to the International Building Code, which state and local officials often use as a model for their rules.
Dunlap, who lives in Alabama, works for an architecture firm and reviews building projects to ensure they comply with access standards. She expects more public agencies and companies will voluntarily install changing tables.
Maybe someday they will be a routine part of public bathrooms, she said. “But I think that’s a long way out in the future, unfortunately.”
KFF Health News is a national newsroom that produces in-depth journalism about health issues and is one of the core operating programs at KFF—an independent source of health policy research, polling, and journalism. Learn more about KFF.
September is National Service Dog Month, and RAWZ Natural Pet Food wants to say “Thank You” to all the service dogs who enhance the quality of life and independence for the people they help!
Service dogs assist hundreds of thousands of Americans every year, and each September, National Service Dog Month is a time to honor and recognize their invaluable contributions. Service dogs receive special training and certification to perform specific tasks for an individual with disabilities. Depending on the needs of the person, a service dog can perform hundreds of tasks centered on things like alerting, detecting, responding, and more. This National Service Dog Month, RAWZ Natural Pet Food wants to recognize eight ways the hard-working service dogs of America help people!
1. Mobility Assistance
One of the many valuable tasks service dogs can perform is mobility assistance. In general, they help individuals with physical disabilities navigate their environment, which can include:
Providing balance support
Retrieving and delivering items
Opening or closing doors
Pressing buttons
Turning on lights
Retrieving mobility aids, such as a walker
2. Diabetic Alerts
Service dogs can also help people with diabetes. For example, they can learn to detect changes in a person’s blood sugar levels and alert the person to hyperglycemia and hypoglycemia. In case of medical emergencies, service dogs can also seek help or alert others nearby.
3. Psychiatric Support
When it comes to mental health conditions, such as post-traumatic stress disorder, service dogs can perform many tasks. They can provide a calming presence, interrupt harmful behaviors, guide their person to an exit, prevent people from approaching, provide deep pressure therapy, and beyond.
4. Autism Support
There are also several ways service dogs can support autistic individuals. They can provide safety, emotional support, sensory regulation, routine, help with tasks, companionship, behavioral cues, and even comfort during social interactions.
5. Hearing Assistance
Safety is one of the most important goals of a service dog helping a person with a hearing impairment. They can alert their handlers to important sounds like alarms and sirens, as well as doorbells and other environmental noises. In social situations, service dogs can also alert their handler that someone is calling their name.
6. Guiding
Guide dogs may be one of the most commonly known service dogs. These dogs provide support to people with visual impairments by helping them navigate their surroundings safely, which includes:
Leading them through their environment
Avoiding obstacles
Providing directional assistance
Navigating public transportation systems
Retrieving items
7. Allergy Detection
For people with severe allergies, service dogs can learn to detect allergens, identify them in the environment and foods, retrieve medications, and seek help in case of an allergic reaction.
8. Seizure Alerts and Response
Some service dogs learn to detect the onset of a seizure. Not only can they alert their handler to prepare for the event, but they can also call for help, retrieve medication, prevent falls and injuries, and provide assistance and comfort afterward.
RAWZ: Supporting the Dogs Who Support People
RAWZ Natural Pet Food is a proud supporter of service dogs. The company donates 100% of its profits (less taxes and reserves) to four main causes, including service dog programs. In fact, in September 2024, they donated $50,000 to National Service Dogs, a charity training Certified Service Dogs to help children with autism, veterans, and first responders with PTSD.
Animal Wellness is North America’s top natural health and lifestyle magazine for dogs and cats, with a readership of over one million every year. AW features articles by some of the most renowned experts in the pet industry, with topics ranging from diet and health related issues, to articles on training, fitness and emotional well being.
This story originally appeared on WIRED Italia and has been translated from Italian.
The 2024 Paris Paralympics have shown the general public how vast, extraordinary, and too often ignored the world of sports for people with disabilities is. Among the events that has garnered the most interest is blind soccer, or more precisely, B1 5-a-side soccer, which demonstrates how visually impaired athletes are able to use extraordinary spatial awareness, as well as speed, precision, and technique.
Like all disciplines practiced by people who are blind or visually impaired, it is regulated by the International Blind Sports Federation (IBSA), founded in Paris in 1981. Here’s how it works.
B1 5-a-Side Soccer Playing Field
There is a distinction here between B2/3 5-a-side soccer, which includes visually impaired people, and B1 soccer, in which most of the players are completely blind: The Paralympics includes only the latter. B1 soccer is played on a rectangular field, the same standard as 5-a-side football/futsal (40 meters long by 20 meters wide). Along the length of the field are 1- to 1.3-meter-high boards that prevent the ball from leaving the playing area.
Players
Each team consists of four movement players (all of whom are blind and must wear a mask) and a goalkeeper (sighted or visually impaired), who must remain in his own 2-meter-deep area, but can guide his teammates by giving directions when defending. When playing in attack, however, the movement players receive directions from an offensive guide who is himself sighted and is located behind the opponent’s goal. When the ball is in midfield, the coach can give directions to his team. Unlike traditional soccer, there’s no offside penalty, which keeps the game moving briskly.
The Ball and Silence
It is essential that, except for the goalkeeper, offensive guide, or coach giving directions, no one speaks during the game. That’s partly because the ball itself is constructed with rattles sewn between the inner tube and the outer shell, which allow blind players to envision its location through sound suggestions. Spectators are asked to remain in strict silence so as not to disturb the players, who must rely on their hearing, such as when one of the players signals to the others that he is making an action toward an opponent. The audience can cheer only after goals.
Match Length
Each B1 5-a-side soccer match is divided into two halves of 20 minutes each, with an intermediate break of up to 10 minutes.
The History of the Sport
It seems that the first 5-a-side blind soccer competitions took place in South America, with Brazil being the pioneer: In fact, the first championship of this discipline was held in the country in 1980, and Brazil has always won the gold medal since the sport became a Paralympic discipline. The game spread to Europe a few years later, with the first European championship recorded in Spain in 1986. Since 2004—that is, since the Athens Olympic Games—B1 5-a-side soccer has been officially included among the disciplines of the Paralympics. In the 2024 edition in Paris, the men’s tournament is being held in a temporary field built under the Eiffel Tower.
Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.
Disability Awareness Month is not just about acknowledging the hardships that come with having a disability — it’s also about recognizing the work of disabled people and how we can make physical spaces, policies and practices more accessible in the workplace.
I’ve lived with Spinal Muscular Atrophy, but I’ve never let it affect my corporate position for over two decades, and I’ve seen firsthand what true inclusion can do for an organization.
Here are three meaningful ways companies can observe Disability Awareness Month and make lasting changes:
1. Organizing educational workshops and training sessions
Team-building training and workshops are the best ways to celebrate Disability Awareness Month. Workshops can dispel myths and prejudices about people with disabilities and educate employees on appropriate etiquette and awareness when discussing and working with people with disabilities. This includes appropriate and inappropriate behavior and language, accessibility considerations and more. Workshops and training sessions can serve as the foundation for creating an inviting environment that can promote the inclusion of people with disabilities in the workplace.
Bring in guest speakers: Inviteexperts, advocates or a person living with a disability to share their insight and experiences. Real-world stories can help employees better understand the difficulties and triumphs faced by people with disabilities. These events are also a way for employees with disabilities to be guest speakers, further enhance the dialogue and build a sense of community and belonging.
Sensitization workshops: Conduct a workshop to educate employees on how to interact with people with disabilities and use correct terminology. The workshop should also create a safe environment where people can learn more about people with disabilities.
Employees will have a better understanding of disabilities, which can lead to more sympathetic and supportive work policies and better accommodation practices and policies within the workplace.
2. Heighten accessibility and accommodation practices
In honor of Disability Awareness Month, take a closer look at the current accessibility and accommodation practices within your company. Ensuring that your working environment, from the physical perspective, is universally accessible to everyone gives a foundation for creating an inclusive environment. Accommodation policies are intended to provide a barrier-free environment that allows people with disabilities to access employment, public services and facilities as independently as possible.
Accessible workplaces are not just about responding to minimum legal requirements; they ensure all employees can perform to the best of their abilities without unnecessary barriers.
Accessibility audit: Have accessibility experts conduct assessments of the physical and electronic workplace. This will reveal where accessibility might be lacking, be it ramps and signs or websites and internal platforms that are more friendly for persons with vision or hearing impairments.
Update accommodation policies: Frequently reevaluate your policies to ensure they are fully implemented across the workforce. Requests to update accommodation policies should not be met with friction — do not automatically refuse an accommodation request or have an inflexible policy that doesn’t allow exceptions. Implement a simple and straightforward procedure for employees to submit a request for accommodations via a dedicated portal with step-by-step instructions where they feel heard and supported. Doing this can alleviate potential aggression or harassment and create a more inclusive and supportive workplace environment. This can also lead to a great opportunity for empathy training for HR and upper management.
Invest in assistive technologies: All employees should be provided with tools and gadgets that will enhance their productivity, such as screen readers, voice recognition technologies, and ergonomic office supplies.
Employers who make their places of work accessible to all consider this a good inclusiveness policy. Such actions would benefit not only the specified employees with disabilities but also all employees, as diversity is an aspect of mutual respect towards employees and results in higher morale and productivity.
3. Celebrate and recognize employee contributions by people with disabilities
Another effective strategy for observing Disability Awareness Month is to celebrate employees with disabilities. Recognition and appreciation can be given in various ways, including honors, awards and talent performance.
Recognition enlightens and accentuates a sense of worth that comes with having a disability among employees.
Spotlight stories: Feature stories of employees with disabilities in company newsletters, social media and internal communication channels. Share their stories, accomplishments and contributions because they will help the team feel inspired and educated.
Awards and recognition: Incorporate awards specifically devoted to honoring the hard work and achievements of all employees, including staff with disabilities.
Talent showcases: Organize an event where employees have a platform to showcase their talents and skills, such as art, music, writing or any other artistry, to appreciate the diversity of talent within the organization.
Celebrating and recognizing the contributions of all employees boosts their morale and makes them feel like part of the team. It also sets an excellent opportunity to appreciate all forms of diversity in the workplace.
Conclusion
Disability Awareness Month affords companies the perfect avenue to increase inclusivity and support for their employees with various disability conditions. Ways to achieve this would be through educational workshops, raising office accessibility, and recognizing contributions by people with disabilities.
These would not only benefit the employees with disabilities but also truly enhance the organizational culture by making it more robust and much more cohesive. Embracing all these makes for real change in life, whereby each employee feels valued and can contribute at their best. I, being one who has gone through the challenges and triumphs of being in the corporate world while disabled, can attest to what a tremendous difference genuine inclusion makes.
Let this month not just be about awareness but about concretizing actions that will make life different for employees with disabilities. Together, we can build workplaces where everyone has the opportunity to thrive.
In 2020, Denver Fencing Center founder Nathan Anderson had a breakthrough.
He’d won a $20,000 grant to turn his gym, right across the street from Ruby Hill Park, into a national hub for wheelchair swordplay.
It was enough to buy all the gear he needed to train athletes worthy of elite competition. All that was left was to find someone who’d go the distance.
When he spoke to us about it back then, he said he dreamt of taking someone to the 2024 Paralympics in Paris. But he wasn’t sure that was in the cards. Four years wasn’t long to whip his new program into that kind of shape.
As Anderson tried to convince some rising athletes to move here and help him secure a medal, he also ramped up local outreach, inviting groups of people recovering from limb loss and from hospitals to come see what the sport was like.
That’s how Jataya Taylor — usually just “J” — ended up in his gym. She’d never seen adaptive fencing when she visited with a group from the local Veterans Affairs hospital in February of 2022. Something about it clicked immediately.
“I had no clue and they brought me here and I fell in love,” she remembered.
Jataya Taylor wears a mask during practice at the Denver Fencing Center, across the street from Ruby Hill. June 27, 2024.Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite
She started training in August of that year, then competing.
For Anderson, it was a sign that his gym was on its way to achieving his larger mission. For Taylor, it was confirmation that the home she found there was exactly where she belonged.
Taylor had no reason to think she’d become an elite athlete for a long time.
She has roots in Rapid City, but spent most of her life in Florida. As a kid, she was athletic and made waves on her high school basketball team.
But her sights were set elsewhere. When she finished school, she joined the Marines.
“In the long run, I honestly didn’t see myself here,” she said before a recent practice. “Maybe excelling in the military and climbing the ranks.”
Things didn’t go the way Taylor expected. Early on, before she was ever deployed, she was seriously injured in a training accident. Her left leg would never fully heal, and her life would change forever.
“For years I was just plain upset. My career was supposed to be the military. That was supposed to be my life, and all of a sudden it was gone,” she told us. “No one ever tells us that when you get hurt, there’s a chance you’re not going to get better.”
Jataya Taylor lifts herself toward the locker area inside the Denver Fencing Center, across the street from Ruby Hill, during another night of practice. June 27, 2024.Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite
She could still walk on her leg, but it was hard, and it could hurt. She said she spent 12 years “fighting” her body before she asked doctors to do something rash.
“I told them to cut off my leg or I would,” she said. “They looked at me like I’m crazy.”
“By the time it came to the amputation, I looked at it as it was like a cancer and it was causing so many problems with the rest of my body, metastasizing, that it just needed to be gone,” she added. “And once it was gone, then I could walk. I could do other things. And my mental health improved, a lot.”
Freeing herself from that chronic physical pain helped her move past the loss she felt about her derailed life. Fencing became a symbol of what she could achieve if she embraced that change.
“That is one of the biggest things that has changed in my life. I can’t remember who wrote the quote, but it goes something like: We spend so much time looking at the door that’s shut in front of us, we don’t see all the doors that opened around us,” she said. “When something happens, it’s not the end of the world. Don’t give up.”
Jataya Taylor preps for a sparring match at the Denver Fencing Center, across the street from Ruby Hill. June 27, 2024.Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite
She fell in love with the sport, but it was the people that kept her going.
While traditional fencers rely on their feet to dodge their opponents and lunge for points, adaptive fencing takes place between people strapped into immobile wheelchairs.
It’s worth noting that not everyone who fences in adaptive competitions has a disability related to walking. Some might have cognitive conditions.
The chair helps level things between everyone. The rigs can tilt if athletes rock them hard enough, but there’s little room for error once the ref declares, “En garde!” It’s a sport about anticipation and precision, and that’s the part Taylor fell for.
“I am strong and fast, but after a while, I realized that’s not the only component that you have to have,” she told us. “That is probably what really brought me in. At first it was really zen … in basketball, if you foul me, I’m going to be mad and play harder and put it in your face. Here I have to play smarter, not harder.”
Jataya Taylor (right) spars with Kevin Averch inside the Denver Fencing Center, across the street from Ruby Hill. June 27, 2024.Molly Cruse/CPR News
But once she entered this world, it was the people that made her stay. As she began to travel and compete, she found she suddenly had friends everywhere.
“That was the biggest thing for me, because it’s such a loving and open community. We are a family, we’re just spread all over the map,” she said. “We might be in our one-minute break, sitting in there laughing, and then ding, ding, ding! Time starts. Bam, bam, bam, bam, bam!I’m going to get you, I’m going to stab you! Then we’re done. High five. Bow.“
“It’s a way to get exercise, still use your mind and make friends that you get to stab.”
She has to pay for her own travel to get to a lot of those competitions, so she was grateful when Anderson offered her a job at the gym. These days, she says the warehouse on Navajo Street has become “the center of my universe.”
Anderson said he’s proud of how far she’s come, and not just because she’s grown as an athlete in such a short period.
He also had something to prove to USA Fencing and the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee, who furnished that money four years ago.
“It’s one of those great success stories, when somebody gives you a grant and you’re hoping that it’s going to turn into something great. In this case, when you have an athlete that goes from zero to the Paralympics in two years, I mean, that’s incredible. So we’re really excited,” he said. “I mean, the US Olympic committee’s probably not going to be happy until we bring back medals for them.”
China and Italy are the teams to beat, he said. Though adaptive sports have grown in the U.S. in recent years, they’re still vastly underfunded compared to those countries.
“They’ve got a million-dollar budget. And we’re kind of like the rebellion in “Star Wars,” where we’re trying to piece everything together and hopefully it works,” Anderson joked.
Jataya Taylor sits in a fencing chair during practice at the Denver Fencing Center, across the street from Ruby Hill. June 27, 2024.Kevin J. Beaty/Denverite
Taylor is competitive, so of course she’d like to bring home a medal. But just being there, on the top of her game, in the company of athletes she’s come to regard as family, she said that’s ultimately the best reward.
“It is about the experience. Because for fencing, every time you lose, you learn something. The only time you actually lose or fail is when you don’t learn something. And that’s what I’ve come to enjoy,” she said. “I am beyond excited.”
MINNEAPOLIS, April 4, 2024 (Newswire.com)
– Carepool makes rideshare traction in the Twin Cities by acquiring Mobility4All. All of the current riders have had a smooth transition and will now enjoy expanded business hours (6 a.m.-12 a.m. to start). Carepool will start providing rideshare services on Monday, April 8.
Carepool was founded in Madison, Wisconsin, in 2018 by CEO Josh Massey, specializing in providing rideshare services to aging and disabled adults.
Massey has purchased the Twin Cities-based Mobility4All accessible ride service. Its motto is: Providing hand-to-hand and door-thru-door trips for people who want or need a higher level of care. This fits Carepool’s philosophy while adding more technology in the process, like real-time text messaging. With the purchase of Mobility4All, Carepool will be providing rideshare services in eight states.
Mobility4All’s customers are able to use Carepool immediately with no lapse in services. Riders will be able to call and book their rides as they have, with the ability to book through the web app. Carepool created rideshare-like technology with the State of Wisconsin’s health and human services departments, focusing on the needs for people with disabilities and older adults. Its model solved rural and wheelchair transportation gaps.
“As I spoke with someone from the State of Wisconsin about having a rideshare service in this space, I thought adding an ‘e’ to the word ‘carpool’ seemed to fit well for company’s name,” Massey said. “At Carepool, we truly care.”
Massey’s inspiration to start a rideshare company came when he lived in Chicago and owned a technology consulting company. Rideshare was a game changer, but some experiences were much better than others. Massey envisioned a way to expand the technology with caring drivers across the Midwest. Rideshare would help aging adults and passengers with special needs, including his grandmother who lived in rural Wisconsin and faced challenges visiting his grandfather in a memory care facility.
“It hit close to home when I heard my 90-year-old grandmother was on Medicaid and taking long bus rides to see my grandfather for an hour, making for seven exhausting hours of travel,” Massey said. “I thought, why can’t we tweak the rideshare model to also serve those in rural and suburban areas?”
What sets Carepool apart is its software platform that allows for recurring rides, designed to sync directly to drivers’ calendars and with Medicaid/Medicare programs and insurance payers, as well as hospital systems, offering “door-through-door service.” Passengers’ special needs are saved to their profile so drivers will know how to handle each customer’s unique situation.
Carepool’s drivers are able to assist customers inside their home or medical facility with getting into the rideshare vehicle. Carepool’s pay rates provide more earning power for its drivers, which includes a set customer pickup rate and 2x more per mile compared to other rideshares in the Twin Cities area.
“Helping others, making a livable wage and having that caring profile is what really matters for Carepool,” Massey added.
Customers can call Carepool at 1-833-268-2688 to order services or go to www.carepool.us/riders to log into the app and order rides. Drivers can go to www.carepool.us/drivers for more information about how to apply.
EATON RAPIDS, Mich., April 3, 2024 (Newswire.com)
– Digication, a leading Ed-Tech company serving millions of users across more than 7,000 K-12 schools and higher education institutions, is thrilled to announce a strategic partnership with Teach Access, a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to making digital accessibility a fundamental component of education. This collaboration, cultivated over the past year, is set to transform the digital learning landscape by integrating accessibility literacy into educational practices.
Deepening Commitment to Accessibility
Digication’s commitment to enhancing accessibility goes beyond compliance with standards; it’s about educating and empowering its user base. Partnering with Teach Access will bring a wealth of resources and tools to Digication’s platform, aiding in creating accessible digital content.
Teach Access is an innovative non-profit collaboration between education, industry, government, and disability advocacy organizations. It addresses the urgent need to enrich students’ understanding of digital accessibility in designing, developing, and creating new technologies, considering the needs of people with disabilities.
Digication and Teach Access envision a future where technology products and services are inherently accessible, with students entering the workforce equipped with knowledge and skills in accessible design and development.
Innovative Tools for Accessible Content Creation
Digication will introduce new features to assist users in creating accessible content, such as notifications for missing image alt text or video captions. This proactive approach ensures that all content on the Digication platform is accessible and inclusive.
A Future of Inclusive Digital Learning
“This partnership is a significant milestone in our mission to make digital learning accessible to all,” said Jeff Yan, CEO of Digication. “Teach Access’ expertise and resources will be invaluable in enhancing accessibility literacy among our users, paving the way for a more inclusive future in digital education.”
Empowering Students and Teachers Through Teach Access Programs
Digication users will have access to free programs and resources for students and educators provided by Teach Access. This includes its Student Academy, Student Ambassador Program, Faculty Fellowship program, and Teach Access Grants for educators. Teach Access has given more than $350,000 in grants to educators to accelerate the integration of accessibility principles in college curricula. Additionally, Teach Access offers a free open educational resource, Curriculum Repository, and several online self-paced courses about disability and accessibility. Programs and resources remain free and open thanks to the support of corporate sponsors, individual and gift-in-kind donations, and grant support.
“We are grateful to Digication for this opportunity to reach their students and educators,” said Kate Sonka, Executive Director of Teach Access. “We aim to create systemic change within education so all students learn the fundamentals about disability and digital accessibility, creating a pipeline of future employees who can create technology accessible and inclusive for everyone. This collaboration greatly increases our visibility, helping us close in on our goal of reaching one million students by 2030.”
About Digication
Digication is a premier ePortfolio technology and assessment tool provider serving millions of users in K-12 and higher education institutions. Its mission is to facilitate dynamic and engaging learning experiences through innovative digital platforms.
About Teach Access
Teach Access is a non-profit 501(c)(3) organization collaborating with education, industry, government, and disability advocacy organizations to address the critical need to enhance students’ understanding of digital accessibility as they learn to design, develop, and build new technologies with the needs of people with disabilities in mind. Teach Access envisions a fully accessible future in which students enter the workforce with knowledge of the needs of people with disabilities and skills in the principles of accessible design and development, such that technology products and services are born accessible.
For more information about this partnership and to access the new resources, please visit Digication.com and TeachAccess.org.
Contact Information: Kate Sonka Executive Director kate@teachaccess.org
