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A resource, not a burden
Lecture
delivered at international seminar: "Sport as an instrument for integration,
rehabilitation, and friendship" held in connection with the Youth Games 2003 in
Aalborg, Denmark
By: Kristian Jensen, director, Danish Disability Sport Information
Centre
For a number of years, I have concerned myself with the question: Why does
sport seem to make such a big difference for people with disabilities, and how
can society take advantage of that?
This is the main idea behind the place where I work: The Danish Disability
Sport Information Centre: That disability sport can be used in different
contexts to improve the conditions for citizens with disabilities.
The centre was established in 1995 as an independent, non-profit
organization.
It is financed by the the Ministry of Culture and the Ministry of Employment.
There is a close link between the Centre and the Danish Sports Organization for
Disabled which is the overall umbrella organization for sport for disabled in
Denmark.
The Centre's main tasks are:
- to collect knowledge about disability sport, and make this knowledge
available to anyone who needs it,
- to find ways to utilize disability sport in all relevant sectors of
society, including: education, rehabilitation, and employment of people with
disabilities.
The message is that sport is not only enjoyable. It is also useful! Why?
Because:
Sport is a simple, cheap, and amusing way to uncover skills in people with
disabilities, and develop these skills further.
It's is simple. You don't need to be an expert to organize it. Thousands of
people with disabilities do it, with a minimum of support and guidance. In fact,
most disability sport is self organized.
It’s cheap. You can use the facilities and structures already available for
sport in the community. If facilities are not available, you can get by with an
even floor, or an outdoor space, a ball, a rope, two sticks and a stone!
It's amusing --- it's fun. In sport, people train because they like it.
If we really wish to include citizens with disabilities as happy and
productive members of our society, we should take a close look at sport!
If we really wish to give people with disabilities an equal opportunity to
participate in community life, including the labour market, we should invest
solid energy in the advancement of sport for people with disabilities - in
schools and vocational training, in hospitals and rehabilitation centres, in
sport clubs as well as in other leisure time activities.
Disability sport is simple, it's cheap, it's amusing - and it's efficient!
Sport gives you an opportunity to learn new skills in a social context.
Learning new skills in a social context, while interacting with a group, is much
more efficient than learning in an isolated situation, or learning in a
traditional therapist-client situation or a traditional teacher-pupil situation.
Learning in a social context, through interaction with a group, is simply more
efficient.
Sport allows for all sorts of
learning:
- learn to move,
- to perceive,
- to dare
- to communicate,
- to express your feelings,
- to respond to challenge,
- learn to place yourself in a
position where you’re able to receive the ball
- learn to take responsibility,
- to accept leadership,
- listen and make yourself heard,
- learn strategic thinking and
tactical behaviour,
- learn to face defeat without
feeling defeated,
- experience victory
Sport offers opportunities to develop
a personal identity that is positive and rewarding, to balance the "disabled"
identity that often follows from a physical, mental or sensory impairment.
Sport offers opportunities to develop
self confidence and courage.
Sport offers opportunities to develop
social competence, to improve your capacity to interact with other people,
disabled and non-disabled.
Sport offers opportunities to develop
the working capacity of people with disabilities!
The reason we may consider people
with disabilities as a burden to society is the fact that we - meaning those of
us who represent "the mainstream, non-disabled society" - have not yet been
willing or able to include people with disabilities fully in the hard core
activities of society: First of all, the labour market. We have not recognized
their talents, we have not discovered their resources.
People with disabilities are often
left on the side line, unproductive, un-included - thus, they become a burden on
society’s economy and, perhaps, a burden on society’s conscience as well.
Who wants to be left on the sideline?
No-one! Everybody wants to be on the court, everybody wants to take part in the
game, to the best of their ability!
How can disabled people contribute to
society?
In a welfare state, people with
disabilities will anticipate that their most basic needs are met by society on a
certain level - food, clothes, health care etc. They may still complain, and ask
for improvements, and this may be justified. But they don’t need to go hungry,
naked, or sick without intervention from the welfare state.
That does not mean that they are
happy with their lives. It lies in the human nature, that once food, clothes,
housing, and health is taken care of, new needs and wants will surface.
At the Centre where I work we help
find jobs for disabled people - jobs in the private sector as well as jobs in
the public sector. We find jobs - and we invent jobs!
Over the last 10 years, in Denmark,
legislation has been passed which has made it possible to create permanent jobs
for people with disabilities in sectors where money for wages is only available
in small amounts. For instance: Jobs in sports clubs, in disability
organizations, and in other non-profit organizations where hands and brains and
enthusiasm is always wanted!
The employer pays part of the wages,
and the government pays the rest.
We call it: flex-jobs, or sheltered
jobs, or in general: supported employment.
Since 1996, 20.000 new jobs for
people with disabilities have been created in Denmark through supported
employment. And many more are waiting for their turn. Our Centre has contributed
with somewhere between 400 and 500 job placements. Some of our very first job
placements were, in fact, here in Aalborg, at the Sports Club for All Disabled.
In the beginning, our job consultants
simply turned up at training sessions in sports clubs for disabled around the
country, and asked if anyone would like to have a job?
We did not have any jobs at hand -
our method has always been: The person first, then the job. It's like disability
sport: If a sport does not work for you, we will adapt it. If we cannot find
any sport that suits you, we'll invent one!
We do the same thing with jobs: Adapt
them, or invent them. It all depends on the person i question.
This is our basic method and
philosophy:
1. The desire to work is the key
The stronger your desire to work is,
the better are your chances to end up with a job. If you are willing to fight
for it, we will be in the fight with you!
And we’re not talking about just any
job. We’re talking about a job that you really enjoy. Living with a disability
can be tough. Work, therefore, like sport, should be fun!
2. Everybody is good at something
Everybody!
I f it’s not evident what a person is
good at, we must keep looking until we find it. It’s there, somewhere. If a
person’s educational background or working experience is scarce, we must look
for personal strengths. A strong character. A keen eye for human relations. A
lifelong interest in dogs, or birds, or books. A leisure time interest in
football or stamps or computer games. A good voice. A smiling face. Patience.
Endurance. The ability to listen.
3. You don’t know what a person can
do, until he or she has had a chance to try it in practise.
Noboby, no matter how much of an expert he or she is, is able to judge, just
by looking at a person, what that person is capable of doing!
Can a blind person learn to play golf? Can a person with severe brain damage
sing in a choir? Can a completely paralyzed person in an electric wheelchair
play Romeo’s part in the play Romeo and Juliet? It so happens! We don’t know in
advance! If he wants to, it's worth a try!
Thus, our aim should always be to give people with disabilities a chance to
live out their dreams in practise. Learn from experience. Succeed, or fail and
try again. Live. Learn. Contribute. To the best of their ability.
However, it’s not all people with disabilities or cronic diseases who
are ready to work. Some may bee too sick, some are in too much pain, some are
too emotionally troubled, or too scared, or too tired.
We should not make the mistake of pushing people into jobs they do not feel
they can handle. Other activities in life may prove more valuable to them. Or
they may need more time to recover, more time to grow, other ways of being
involved.
In this country, at this very moment, unfortunately, some people with
disabilities and are pushed too hard to go to work. They are pushed, not because
we want to help them, but because society has decided that it wants to cut down
the expenditure on social benefits.
This is the dark side of the Danish national supported employment scheme. But
that’s a different story. A story, not to be told today.
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