2009 World Winter Games PDL: EDUCATION INITIATIVE “This curriculum takes a giant step in promoting acceptance and changing perceptions of people with intellectual disabilities. It will better enable teachers across Idaho to educate our youth about diversity, respect and compassion. I encourage all K-12 educators in Idaho to utilize the lessons and activities included in this curriculum. We have a unique opportunity to inspire actions of thoughtfulness among our youth and enrich their lives.” – First Lady Lori Otter Functional Area Lead Team Members: Heather Hill, VP Marketing & Communications Mary Gervase, Director, Education Initiative Joan Scofield, Director, Brand Management / Justine Sgalio, Manager, Media Relations I. Plan II. Do III. Learn Overview/Purpose: K-12 Education Initiative designed to provide tools and resources to teach youth about compassion, diversity, acceptance and inclusion, as exemplified through the Special Olympics movement and its athletes. Position the Education Initiative as part of an overall community education campaign during this once in a lifetime teachable moment. Goals & Objectives: Engage youth in meaningful, active collaboration and dialogue through lessons, leadership conferences, assemblies, volunteering, fundraising and more. Challenge youth to act with thoughtfulness, compassion and respect. Celebrate courage, tenacity and the dignity of human life through involvement in Special Olympics and the World Winter Games. Build a universal curriculum that challenges perceptions about disabilities, including intellectual disability, builds capacity for youth engagement, fosters cultural understanding and values diversity. Reach youth where they are – public and private schools, home schools, after school programs, clubs, online and more. Inform about ways to become involved with Special Olympics. Key Responsibilities: Develop a K-12 curriculum that is easily delivered, concise and pertinent that focuses on four key areas: Understanding differences Celebrating differences Personalizing differences Making a difference Earn support and endorsement of education leaders to help validate and promote the curriculum. Distribute and implement the curriculum as part of an overall community education campaign. Design, package and deliver curriculum to complement the timing and efforts of the World Winter Games. Leverage messaging and successes of the curriculum to tell a greater and broader story. External Resources: Shanna Endow/Special Olympics Idaho – Provided crucial support to Director of Education Initiative in school outreach and curriculum distribution and implementation. Oliver Russell & Associates – Designed packaging and helped coordinate production and distribution of curriculum. SOVRN Creative – Designed interactive DVD platform and web accessibility to curriculum content to be linked from idso.org. Gold Link Media & Table Rock Printing – Supporting vendors. Legacy: Through collaboration with SO Idaho and pre-planned program longevity beyond the World Winter Games, the GOC will establish a credible resource of teaching core values to our youth and provide ways for them to have direct experiences with people with intellectual disabilities, which in turn can more effectively lead to attitude and behavioral change. Schedules/Timelines: The education initiative was envisioned, authored, designed and implemented over an 19 month timeframe (Aug 2007 – Feb 2009) Aug 2007 – Aug 2008 – Development, Production & Promotion Sept 2008 – Distribution via mailed copy Jan 2009 – current – Materials available via hard copy and online through idso.org Components: Lessons – Lesson Plans, Activities, DVDs, Literature, PowerPoint Presentations and Hyperlinks available at idso.org. Guest Speakers – Special Olympics athletes and Global Messengers Sports Demonstrations – Special Olympics athletes Ban the R Word – Encouragement to start a campaign Volunteer – Volunteer and “Be a fan” opportunities promoted Partners Club – Driven by SO Idaho Fundraising – McCain Foods kits, encouragement to be creative Youth Leadership Conferences & Global Youth Summit Global Youth Rally – SOI initiative at Games time Successes: Formal endorsement and promotion of the curriculum by First Lady Lori Otter and Superintendent Tom Luna. Graduate level diversity course developed for delivery through conferences, in-service programs and online. Course offered the ability for educators to earn a graduate credit for teaching the curriculum and completing pre and post evaluations. Curriculum taught to additional 1,500 students as part of graduate credit fulfillment. 60 teachers have received credit to date. 871 Copies of curriculum mailed to every Idaho public and private school in September 2008. Additional 200+ copies of curriculum requested since mailing. Additional 91 Idaho teachers and their 19,000 students have received the curriculum online since online launch in January 2009. 56 schools participated in McCain Foods fundraising program (28,000 students). 50 schools participated in Torch Run activities (25,000 students). 239,558 estimated overall student involvement via: Curriculum distribution by mail and online School assembly attendance and participation McCain Foods fundraising program Youth Summits & Global Youth Rally Graduate Credit fulfillment requirements Torch Run involvement Opening & Closing Ceremonies involvement Estimated 100,000 additional students involved through other activities not reported. World Winter Games awarded $1k grant to Valley View Elementary School per a random drawing online survey contest, among educators who taught and provided feedback on the curriculum. Request for Director, Education Initiative to serve on SO Idaho board to capitalize on inroads made by this Education Initiative and to assist staff in expanding these efforts. Challenges: Lack of long term preliminary planning from a baseline measurement standpoint will hinder complete evaluation for first year of implementation. Lack of clarity on funding support and priorities in the overall scope of the Education Initiative delayed final development and launch. SO Idaho website capabilities to host the curriculum at the time of the launch in September 2008 were limited – online launch Jan 2009. Key Learnings: Outreach through the schools with an easy to deliver, concise and relevant program can build awareness and support of Special Olympics overall, and can provide a meaningful marketing platform for the local program. Recommendations: SOI consider ways to offer the “In a World of Differences, Make a Difference” curriculum as an option through specialolympics.org. SO Idaho issue surveys measuring attitudes of students, teachers and youth leaders before and after 2009 curriculum implementation. SO Idaho conduct focus groups and interviews with students, teachers and youth leaders for qualitative feedback. SO Idaho update curriculum annually with new, dynamic content. Update and supplement content and resources to replace Games-specific references with more universal lessons/materials. Recommended “Danny the Bagger” or “Including Samuel” DVD/discussion guides Consider translation into multiple languages including Spanish. Continue to incentivize educators to teach the curriculum through programs like the graduate credit offering. Develop regional youth summits or conferences to enable more youth to learn and become engaged in the SO movement. Provide youth conference curriculum and instruction manuals online to encourage replication of conferences nationally/internationally. Design web pages relevant to the interests of the different users including educators, youth and youth leaders. Develop strategic partnerships with like-minded websites to increase traffic and exposure for SO Idaho and the curriculum. Consider budgeting for promotional kits designed per grade level. Consider budgeting for commissioned book by Todd Parr – “In a World of Differences, Make a Difference”, and associated costs for online hosting of the book to share on an international level. Consider budgeting for SO Idaho education staff to present the updated curriculum at regional and national education conferences. Budget – Planned vs. Actual PLANNED - $250,000 ACTUAL - $222,834 Salaries & Benefits - $146,845 Contract Labor - $263 Publications & Materials - $35,440 Entertainment, Meetings & Seminars - $237 Marketing & Communications - $26,000 Supplies, Postage & Shipping - $3,047 Travel - $11,002