Sara Parker has been involved with Special Olympics since she was 4, shortly after she was diagnosed with autism.
At the time, she was almost nonverbal and lacked fine motor skills. Now she is a communications major at the University of South Florida.
Parker also advocates for Special Olympics, in February, she went to Washington, D.C., to lobby Congress to continue its financial support, since athletes do not have to pay to participate in Special Olympics and funding is essential.
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Parker began playing soccer through Special Olympics and, in middle school, discovered rhythmic gymnastics. Then in high school, through Special Olympics, she participated in Athlete Leadership — which offers public speaking training and opportunities to take part in fundraisers.
She is still involved in rhythmic gymnastics and is in Xcel, a pre-competitive USA Gymnastics program. And, she says the Athlete Leadership training was a big reason why she decided to study communications in college.
Parker has expressed her desire to work for Special Olympics after graduating. She spoke to WUSF’s Catherine Paulitz about why Special Olympics is such an important part of her life.
This conversation has been lightly edited for clarity and length.
What makes the organization so meaningful to you?
It's the chance to be included, the chance to feel accepted. And my favorite metaphor is the box people with disabilities are often stigmatized and put into a box of expectations, and Special Olympics gives athletes like me a chance to break out of the box and to do meaningful activities in our community, as well as a chance to feel accepted.
Earlier this year, in February, you got the chance to go to Congress to represent Special Olympics. Can you explain what did you do specifically for that? And what was the experience like?
The experience was amazing. On Sunday, I flew into Washington, D.C. I got a chance to see a little bit of where our nation practically started, and to see up close the Lincoln Memorial, the Washington Monument, the White House. It was so cool to see all that. Monday was a really effective day, because that was training, and then Tuesday and Wednesday were the days I got to meet with the representatives. And that was an amazing opportunity. Even though I only met with mostly aides of the representatives and one representative, it was still cool to be able to share my story about something that means so much to me, and have a chance to advocate for a cause that I would hope really get a chance to help people like the Special Olympics — because Special Olympics offers athletes like me a chance to improve our lives through educational and health programs, which were the two big programs that I marketed while I was at Washington, D.C.
You're a communication major here at USF. What are some of your goals outside of college?
Some of my goals are to hopefully become an advocate for people with autism, as well as the Special Olympics, because I feel like I was given this voice and this ability to speak, I might as well use it for good, to help improve our community and get stories that are not really told about people with disabilities out there.
What are your hopes for people with autism in this country, like how they're viewed, what they can do, everything like that?
I think people with autism need to have access to more resources, especially adults with autism, because most of the autism resources in this country are for kids under the age of 18. So, I feel like there needs to be more resources for adults with autism, especially 18-, 19-, 20-year-olds who are transitioning from being kids with autism to adults with autism. Adulting is already hard for all of us, but could you imagine having a developmental disability that will make it 100 times harder?
