Volleyball Brings Special Olympics Teams Together

Athletes from six Westchester County schools converged on Mamaroneck's Hommocks Middle School gym Wednesday afternoon for the culminating event of the Special Olympics Pioneer School Sports League—the volleyball tournament.

The Pioneer School Sports League is a cooperative sports program with Westchester and Putnam Special Olympics, and falls under the umbrella of the Hudson Valley Special Olympics.

The sounds of whistles blowing and volleyballs hitting the ground told the aural story from this round robin-style tournament, which has been held at the Hommocks every year since its inception in 1992. However, the heart of the story was in the visuals: the participants, all children from the ages of 14 to 21 with intellectual disabilities, laughed, smiled and cheered their way through an afternoon of volleyball.

"These kids have such excitement in their eyes," said Liz Foster, a volunteer referee who has been helping out with the league since she was in eighth grade. "That's the best part of the experience for me."

Foster was initially asked to give a hand by Suzanne Elson, her seventh and eighth grade volleyball coach at Hommocks. Elson, who has coached eighth grade volleyball since 2003 and, before that, varsity volleyball since 1975, acted as host and coordinator for Wednesday's tournament. Rather than calling it just a competition between teams, Elson described the tournament as more of a culmination of the league's year, which starts in November and also includes soccer, floor hockey, basketball and track and field. 

The volleyball tournament is held twice a year, but the teams practice every week, said one parent.

Participating teams on Wednesday included Mamaroneck, White Plains, Bronxville, Port Chester, Lakeland and Sleepy Hollow. Teams unable to attend were Bedford Hills, Ardsley, and New Rochelle.

Players on each school's team are grouped into one of three levels of play—A, B, or C—based on their abilities. Players of a particular level from one team seek out another team with players of the same level.

And after athletes graduate from high school—which, for children with intellectual disabilities, can occur up until they are 21—they need not say goodbye to organized volleyball. There's Elson's Sound Shore Stars, a volleyball league for adults 21 and older with intellectual disabilities.

Hudson Valley is one of several regional offices for Special Olympics New York, which was introduced to Westchester-Putnam counties in 1972.

According to the Website for Special Olympics New York, which is the largest program of its type in the U.S. serving 47,654 athletes with 25,000 volunteers, the goal of their events is to give children with intellectual disabilities, "continuing opportunities to develop physical fitness, demonstrate courage, experience joy, and participate in a sharing of skills and friendship with their families, Special Olympics athletes and the community."