Every year, the Sports for Life program competes in tournaments for bocce ball in the winter, bowling in the fall and basketball in the spring. The team spends time after school practicing for their final games, usually from 2-3 pm.

    The tournaments are the main events of the Sports for Life seasons, where students “compete with kids from other high schools who are also part of Sports for Life,” says Mrs. Sullivan, a coordinator of Sports for Life.

   The bocce ball tournament is in October at Bel Air High School, the bowling tournament is at Forest Hill Lanes in February and the basketball tournament is in April at Harford Tech. This year, the teams lost the bocce ball and bowling tournament, but came out with a very successful basketball season. The students “had three games; we won one, tied one, and lost one,” says Sullivan.

    The Sports for Life program has a good amount of students participating, but the team could always use more participants. “ We need students with disabilities to participate, which we’re pretty good at rallying those guys up because we know who they are, and then we could also use peer buddies to help out,” says Sullivan. Unfortunately, the program was short on volunteers this year, and were unable to find anyone to help with bocce ball and bowling.

    The program was able to find volunteers for this basketball season, including senior Jay Dilworth. “I got involved from Mrs. Mathews down at the office, she asked me if I wanted to do it and I said, ‘sure that sounds fun’,” says Dilworth.

    Even though the team had two volunteers this season, they could always use more general-ed students to help. Sullivan says that “just to have one general-ed student/peer buddy for every three-four kids with special needs would really help.”

    If any students are interested in joining the Sports for Life team, they are encouraged to take part in this program. The team had a very successful basketball season this year, and hopes are high that they will bring this success into the next year’s seasons.

Jay “I got involved from Mrs. Mathews down at the office, she asked me if I wanted to do it and I said ‘sure that sounds fun’ and then we have practices on mondays and wednesdays right after school until three. We had a big game right with all the other schools at Harford Tech two weeks ago, and we tied two of them and lost one”

Mrs. Sullivan “There’s three sports, there’s bocce in the fall, bowling in the winter, and basketball in the spring, and basically it’s just activities for students with special needs so they can get involved and be part of the sports in high school. We do practices here at the school after school, just like any other sport, it’s a little bit shorter of a season, and then they all end up in a tournament, so the bocce tournament is at Bel Air High School in October, the bowling tournament is at Forest Hill Lanes in February, and then the basketball tournament is at Harford Tech in April. At this point they’re competing with kids from other high schools who are also part of Sports for Life. We need students with disabilities to participate, which we’re pretty good at rallying those guys up because we know who they are, and then we could also use peer buddies to help out. We had two great general-ed students help out for basketball this year, that was really helpful. I don’t remember if we had any volunteers for batchi, but I know we didn’t find anybody to help for bowling, so just to have one general-ed student/peer buddy for every three-four kids with special needs, so it would help if we had some more general-ed involvement. In basketball, we had three games, we won one, tied one, and lost one.”