A day in the life of the disabled

It was an unfair competition. There were more shortcuts and turbo boosts than Bryan Demaray knew existed in the hallways of Klahowya Secondary School.

“As far as the wheelchair races, you guys are all cheaters,” he told the more than 1,000 KSS students at the end-of-school assembly Friday.

Demaray, the Associate Student Body adviser, scorned the participants only jokingly and announced everybody who raced at lunch time was a winner. Most of the competitors had chosen to confine themselves to the chairs for the duration of the school day.

As part of the first Disability Awareness Day at KSS, 101 students volunteered to restrict themselves with wheelchairs, crutches, knee immobilizers, neck braces, earplugs, tape over the mouth or blindfolds. Some combined more than one disability.

“Be really glad you have a choice not to have a disability because that could change any day,” Demaray told the crowd of seventh- through 12th-graders.

The Disability Awareness Day was junior Daman Wandke’s idea. Heavily involved with ASB, Wandke has had student senator, ASB Webmaster and communications committee chairperson titles on his leadership resume.

“He always seems to have a pulse beat on everything that goes on around here,” Demaray said.

Taking Demaray’s leadership class about two years ago, Wandke had the tools to put on the day-long event with disability simulations for students, an assembly, an informational meeting and a fund-raiser dinner after school.

“I pointed him in the right direction and got out of his way,” Demaray said smiling.

That was a few months ago, in late September. Since then, with 100 hours of preparation work, help from four KSS clubs, DECA, National Honor Society, Unity Club and Key Club, Wandke’s program went without a glitch Dec. 9.

It was a close call, though, when Wandke and his helpers found out at the last minute they were short about 13 wheelchairs. Olympic Pharmacy added five to their list of equipment and Farrell’s Home Health rolled in 10 more chairs from Bremerton at the end of last week, just before the program at KSS.

Wheelchairs NW, Harrison Medical Center’s rehabilitation program in Silverdale, United Cerebral Palsy of South Puget Sound, and Klahowya’s sports medicine program contributed equipment as well.

Wandke is the Webmaster for UCP-SPS and the organization became the main sponsor for Disability Awareness Day at KSS. The event was in fact the first under the Disability Awareness Program, which Wandke created.

He has plans to expand the project next year and speak at every school in the Central Kitsap School District.

The original Disability Aware-ness Day, however, was aimed at his classmates at Klahowya. Heavily involved with ASB, NHS and DECA — an association of marketing students, Wandke has ran for office several times in his high school career.

Last year, he ran for ASB president and DECA president and lost by small margins, he said.

“Many of my friends heard people saying, ‘I didn’t vote for Daman because of (his) disability,’” Wandke said. “That aggravated me and I knew I needed to find a way to change their views.”

That way was by organizing the opportunity for volunteers to experience a day in the life of a person with a disability like his own, cerebral palsy, which limits his control over his muscle movements and makes his speech difficult to understand for the untrained ear.

Students who took part in the disability simulation, gave up control of their legs, arms, knees, hands, etc.

Teachers and staff were pleased with how seriously the students took the project.

“We put more than a few roadblocks in their way,” Demaray said.

Each volunteer had to take a form home, get permission from all teachers they had classes with Friday, and some — blindfolded and quadriplegics who had all limbs fastened to their wheelchair for the day — had to find a helper to assist them in navigating the busy hallways.

“There was an atmosphere of respect,” Demaray said. “It was for real. Just in today alone (I saw) a tremendous change in (students’) attitude and not just about people with disabilities, but about themselves.”

Wandke had a few roadblocks to overcome as well. He had to convince the school’s administrators to sacrifice time for the assembly, and preview presentation and in-class discussions earlier in the week.

Disability Awareness Day turned out to be an easier sell than expected. Principal Ryan Stevens considered Wandke’s request and decided to support his efforts.

“What’s 30 minutes of a school day compared to what they’ll take away from it,” he said about giving up half-an-hour of class time for the assembly.

Guest speaker Kevin Berg also hoped KSS students would walk away from the disability simulation with new lessons learned.

“I really want to encourage you to take what you learned today into the world. There are so many adults out there who don’t know what you learned today,” said Melinda Berg, echoing her husband’s words which would have been hard to decipher for the audience, unaccustomed to his speech altered by cerebral palsy.

“I know I look weird. I’m comfortable with that. I know I talk funny. I’m comfortable with that too,” he said. “I want you to be able to treat people like me just like you treat anybody else. Don’t be afraid to go up to them. Don’t be afraid to ask questions.”

The Bergs were invited to the Disability Awareness Day by Wandke. Kevin Berg is a mentor for DO-IT (Disabilities, Opportunities, Internetworking, and Technology) at the University of Washington.

Wandke is a scholar with a DO-IT program helping prepare high school students with disabilities for college life. Sheryl Burgstahler, DO-IT director, also spoke at the KSS after school event and dinner, upon Wandke’s request.

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