Finding Joy Through Challenge: Sarah Haines on the Impact of Special Olympics Texas | Non-profit Series

Anthony Codispoti: Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from their successes and be inspired by how they’ve overcome adversity. My name is Anthony Codispoti and today’s guest is Sarah Haines, Chief Administrative Officer and Regional Executive Director at Special Olympics Texas, a non-profit organization dedicated to providing year-round sports training and competitions for children and adults with intellectual disabilities. Their main focus is to help these athletes develop physical fitness, demonstrate courage, and find joy in everything they do. Under Sarah’s stewardship, the organization continues to promote inclusion and acceptance, supporting thousands of athletes across the state. Sarah has an extensive background in leadership roles, including serving as Senior Director of Connectivity at Special Olympics Texas and Senior Director of Volunteers and Competitions at Special Olympics Arizona. She also held positions in operations and membership management, showing her commitment to fostering meaningful connections. Now before we get into all that good stuff, today’s episode is brought to you by my company, AdBAC Benefits Agency, where we offer very specific and unique employee benefits that are both great for your team and fiscally optimized for your bottom line. One recent client was able to add over $900 per employee per year in extra cash flow by implementing one of our innovative programs. Results vary for each company and some organizations may not be eligible.

To find out if your group qualifies, contact us today at adbackbenefitsagency.com. Now back to our guest today, the Chief Admin Officer and Regional Executive Director of Special Olympics Texas, Sarah Haynes. I appreciate you making the time to share your story today.

Sarah Haines: Thank you so much for having me.

Anthony Codispoti: Okay, so Sarah, every story has an inspiring beginning. Where does your start? How did you find yourself in the Special Olympics world?

Sarah Haines: So I had obviously heard of Special Olympics, but didn’t have any real connection to it. But I was very lucky to have a mentor in my life who became the Chief Financial Officer at Special Olympics, Arizona, and he called me up and said, Sarah, I think you need to be here. I think this is a place where you can thrive.

And I was quite happy where I was. But, you know, I trusted this mentor. He really had my best interest at heart and invited me to come join him at Special Olympics in the finance department, working in accounting, which was not my strong suit. But I immediately fell in love with the mission, the opportunities, the athletes. And so, yeah, I’m so glad that I took that leap.

Anthony Codispoti: So finance wasn’t your background. What was it? Why did this mentor think, hey, Sarah, come join us here in this role that’s not a good fit for you?

Sarah Haines: We’d worked together for many years. I am very blessed to have been taught from a young age about a great work ethic. And when you commit to something committing fully, and so I think that that’s what he saw in me. I’m not an athlete. I’m not physically gifted.

So it didn’t seem like, you know, a lot of synergy between the two. But the beauty of Special Olympics is that you just need to want to be a part, to be successful here. And so I think that’s why I got that invitation. And I really jumped at every chance to be a part of what we were doing, regardless of whether it fell into finance and accounting or not.

Anthony Codispoti: So for those who are unfamiliar, explain what is Special Olympic? What’s it about? What takes place?

Sarah Haines: So Special Olympics was created by Eunice Kennedy Shriver, really to honor her sister, who had an intellectual disability. And so when it started, essentially it was at the Kennedy Compound. She invited people with intellectual disabilities to her home, and they played sports. And so from there, it has grown to a global movement that invites individuals with intellectual disabilities to grow, learn, make friends through the platform of sport. And so what we do is provide training and competition in a variety of sports for individuals with intellectual disabilities. And those individuals without intellectual disabilities come to support and be a part of that.

Anthony Codispoti: So you say it’s a global movement now. Is it kind of like the traditional Olympics? Every four years, there’s a host site somewhere around the world and everybody travels to that?

Sarah Haines: So Special Olympics, again, global movement. And then every region of the globe has its own Special Olympics competition. So to start from the grassroots area, we have our local competitions, athletes from a specific neighborhood or city. They train and compete that they can move up to an area competition, a larger part of their state. From there, they can move up to a state competition. In Texas, we host four every year in a variety of sports, a winter games, a summer games, a fall classic, and a basketball competition. And then from there, you can move up to a USA Games, which is just the athletes from the United States.

And that is done every four years. And then from there, you have the opportunity to compete internationally. And they do a winter games, and then a summer games, and they alternate those every two years. So, and those are obviously athletes from around the globe.

Anthony Codispoti: So when was the last big one in the US? Where was it? And when’s the next one?

Sarah Haines: So the last big one was in 2022 in Orlando, the USA Games, Special Olympics, Texas. We were the second largest delegation behind Florida. We were very proud of that. And the next USA Games will be held in Minnesota in 2026.

Anthony Codispoti: And how about the global one? Where was that? Where will the next one be?

Sarah Haines: So the last summer games were in Berlin in, let’s see, for doing the games this year. They were two years ago. And then this year, it will be the World Winter Games in Torino, Italy, where Special Olympics, Texas is sending a female floorball team.

Anthony Codispoti: Floorball? Yes. What is floorball?

Sarah Haines: So floorball is very similar to floor hockey. It’s maybe a little less aggressive, played with smaller sticks, and doesn’t require all of the safety gear. It’s a smaller rink, but it’s a very fast action-paced game that our athletes absolutely love. And a fantastic opportunity, again, for the ladies to get that opportunity to play team sports, which is a little unusual. And so we really are excited for this team to go and represent the US in Italy.

Anthony Codispoti: Oh, that’s fun. Now, Torino, Berlin, are traditionally like, are the Special Olympics traditionally held in locations that have previously held the main Olympics? Or is that just sort of coincidence with those? No.

Sarah Haines: So obviously, with Special Olympics, we expect the premier venues that the traditional Olympics expects. And so very often we find ourselves in those similar locations. But previous to Berlin, those last World Summer Games were held in Abu Dhabi, which has not seen a traditional Olympics. But their interest in bringing Special Olympics to their country and to show off what is available in Abu Dhabi was amazing. So we go where the community is excited and interested to have us.

Anthony Codispoti: That makes sense. Okay, so who can participate in Special Olympics? How does that determine?

Sarah Haines: So traditionally, when you think of Special Olympics, obviously, we talk about those athletes with an intellectual disability. Now, with an intellectual disability, there oftentimes comes with a physical disability. But their primary diagnosis needs to be one of an intellectual disability. The standard of that really differs per state. So it really just requires that a doctor says, yes, this individual has an intellectual disability. Within Special Olympics, we start our athletes off with our young athletes program at two and a half.

It is completely unified, which means that we accept anybody, whether they have an intellectual disability or they don’t. And it’s an opportunity to learn fine motor skills, how to listen, how to take turns, how to be on a team, and how to establish what interest in what sport these individuals may have from there. That’s two and a half to seven. Then there is a little program called Under 8 Can’t Wait. And those are for those athletes, six, seven, just seven and a half, who aren’t quite ready to compete on a team at a competition.

And it’s more of a training system. Once you hit age eight, you are eligible to be an official Special Olympics athlete. And then our athletes, we still have athletes competing into their 70s and 80s. So there’s no end time to being an athlete with Special Olympics. Okay.

Anthony Codispoti: Is there an opportunity for neurotypical people to participate? Or that’s not how this is set up? Absolutely.

Sarah Haines: So when Special Olympics started, the joy was bringing people who have been isolated, who were outside of the community into being a part of a group to play with people with their same abilities and their same interests.

And that was wonderful. But what that did was isolate people. And Special Olympics started to understand that our goal is not to isolate people with intellectual disabilities, but is to bring the community the awareness of people with disabilities and how much they have to give to the community. So Special Olympics started unified sports. And what that does is take individuals with and without disabilities and play system together on the playing field to play on any sport that we do can be played unified, whether that’s a golf pair, which is a father and a son, or it could be a high school basketball team with two unified partners, those without the disabilities, and three Special Olympics athletes playing together on that same team.

And if you can imagine, you’re in high school and you have an intellectual disability and you’re potentially isolated off in that special education learning room. Maybe it’s in the basement or one of the portables out back, but you get the opportunity to play on your school team with your classmates, get to wear your school colors and the uniform and ride the bus to competitions and be a part of that school campus community. It’s one of the best improvements that Special Olympics has made in its programming in the over 50 years that Special Olympics has been established.

When was that introduced? So we are actually in year 17 of our, we is now called Unified Champion Schools. And so that is taking this Special Olympics programming straight into the schools. And not only is it the sports programming that we just shared, but it also includes inclusive youth leadership. So finding opportunities for those students to be the leaders of their school campuses and their school clubs, the student councils, and also whole school engagement. How do we get the entire school to be a part of the unified movement? And it’s one of, again, the most successful things that we’re seeing globally with Special Olympics.

Anthony Codispoti: So let’s go back to a bit of your story, Sarah. You started out in Arizona in finance, but you, through your explanation, said you were, you know, trying to get involved in all aspects of it. What was sort of the path that eventually took you to Texas and where you are now?

Sarah Haines: So about a year into my time at Special Olympics Arizona, we got a new CEO, Tim Martin, and he has really got a knack for finding where people belong within the organization. And so I used to go out to every opportunity, every event I could, whether it was a track meet up in Lake Havasu or a golf tournament down in Yuma. If there was something to do, I, my hand was raised, I want to be there. And that’s actually how Tim found me once, was he showed up at Yuma for this golf tournament. And there I was, and he’s, what are you doing here?

Finance doesn’t go to these things. And I was like, no, I love it. I love it. So he gave me the opportunity to move into volunteer management, which gave me the opportunity to go to every competition and to learn the sports and understand how Special Olympics worked, how the sports work. Because again, I wasn’t an athlete, but I was very interested in how everything moved along. And so from there, Tim then said, you know what, I want to give you state competitions.

I want you to run our state competitions and really took on to that because again, I got to go to everything because I got to be a part. And then Tim got the opportunity to become the CEO here in Texas. And the differences, Arizona was in a great place, very well run program.

But it is a third the size of Texas, the amount of athletes that we had the ability to be a part of and help here in Texas, we just were never going to be able to match that in Arizona. And so that’s how he learned me. He said, Sarah, there’s so many more athletes we can help. And so I thought, you know, you’re absolutely right. And I jump into it and moved to Texas in 2018. Wow.

Anthony Codispoti: What is it that drew you into this so much? What is it that you get so much joy from?

Sarah Haines: So I could take it back to my first competition that I went to. And it was a swimming competition. And what I saw just blew me away. So our athletes come in every age, size, shape. And they’re walking around this venue in their swimsuits. You know, we had one athlete, I remember Clinton, who needed suspenders to hold his swimsuit up. And so he’s proudly walking around this venue. Nobody was wearing cover ups.

Nobody was shy or embarrassed or ashamed of the way they looked. And the athletes would run up and they, you know, look at what I won. And they’d want to show you the medal.

You’ve got to come see me swim. And I was new. They didn’t know who I was, but they took to me so quickly.

And I thought, this, this, this is included. This is somebody who is accepting of me. This is a group that wants me here because I want to be here. And I, from that moment, just fell in love with the feeling that you get from being included in a joyous group of people. And so I’m addicted to that feeling.

Anthony Codispoti: Where does the funding for all this come from?

Sarah Haines: So Special Olympics gets all of its funding from the community. We do not charge our athletes to train and compete. So unlike other youth sports and club sports where parents are shelling out thousands of dollars, our athletes are able to sign up and train and compete for free in order for that to happen for equipment, for uniforms, for the cost of venues, all of that comes from donations, whether that’s corporate sponsors, individuals, our largest donors to Special Olympics globally is the law enforcement torch run. Law enforcement has adopted Special Olympics as one of its charities of choice. They go out and fundraise, you know, millions of dollars every year to help support the cost to provide this training in these competitions for our athletes.

Anthony Codispoti: Tell me more about what is the torch run?

Sarah Haines: So the torch run started actually in Kansas. Chief Robert Lemunion got the opportunity, got a call from Special Olympics Kansas. Do you want to come out and put some medals on some athletes? And he said, sure, why not? Came out there and like me, he fell in love with it. He saw the joy of the athletes, you know, giving medals is one of the best volunteer jobs at Special Olympics. And after doing it for one games, he said, you know what, I think I can help him out. So that first run, then he said, just like the traditional Olympics, they get a torch, they light it, ran through town, raised about $300, said, you know what, we can do better.

And so from there it has grown. And so officers spend all year doing different types of fundraising for Special Olympics anywhere from serving food at restaurants. And it’s a tip of cop where people are able to to tip the officers for for serving the food. Cop on top where they sit on donut shops and lower a little basket and collect money, selling t-shirts, all sorts of fundraisers, the polar plunges that you hear about, all run by law enforcement, torch run. And then just leading up into our summer games, officers from around the state will run the torch through their cities, and then into our opening ceremonies at summer games and light the cauldron with our athletes. And so it’s really one of the most amazing moments in sports for me. And they are great volunteer base and fundraising base for us.

Anthony Codispoti: So does each state organize sort of their own fundraising then? And this torch run is happening in many most states? Absolutely.

Sarah Haines: So each Special Olympics, each state is its own Special Olympics, essentially, other than California, they are northern California and southern California, because they couldn’t really get along. And so each state then does its own fundraising. We get so much support from Special Olympics International with ideas and support with fundraising, like the polar plunge. We just did one up near Fort Cabosos in Colleen, Texas. And Special Olympics International came and helped us out at the armed services YMCA for that polar plunge.

So we all get a lot of support. Law enforcement, they travel to different conferences to learn how they can better support Special Olympics. They act as unified partners with our athletes in different sports, and some of the actors coaches and create teams so that our athletes have somebody to participate with.

Anthony Codispoti: So I want to get a better idea, Sarah, of what the Chief Administrative Officer does. Can you maybe give us an example of a strategy that you introduced that significantly impacted the operations there at Special Olympics, Texas? Sure.

Sarah Haines: So Chief Administrative Officer, I don’t want to say is a glorified HR, but it’s a big part of what I do. One of the things that I love best about Special Olympics is the opportunities that I’ve gotten as an individual to grow, to learn, to become a better business person, to learn how to fundraise, all the things that make you a valuable member of an organization. And I really want to translate that into encouraging and bringing in new staff to learn to get those same opportunities that I did. So one of the things that we’re developing and have developed is our professional development within Special Olympics, the opportunities to learn the different aspects of Special Olympics. I got to start in finance, moved into volunteers.

Most folks have an interest in sports. They start as a program director. But how do they learn how to budget? How do they learn how to recruit volunteers? And so establishing a mentorship system within Special Olympics so that the staff can learn from each other to learn and grow so that when I retire, there’s somebody who’s come up behind me who’s as excited about the opportunities at Special Olympics as I am. So that’s something that I really very passionate about.

Anthony Codispoti: So aside from the professional development internally that you offer there, what other strategies have you tried and found success with to recruit good folks to join you? And then once they’re there to hold on to them?

Sarah Haines: The thing that with Special Olympics is that there is no real good correlation of what you do at Special Olympics to a job somewhere else. It feels very unique to us. And one of the things that I’m really proud about here in Texas is that the understanding that this is not an eight to five Monday through Friday job. We work when other people recreate. And so being flexible, understanding that we need to be available when our athletes are available and giving our staff the opportunities to work when and where they work best.

COVID of course, you know, forced everybody to work from home. And we learned a lot of different techniques at Special Olympics to stay connected to our athletes, stay connected to each other, stay connected to our volunteers and our donors. And so encouraging that type of creativity and independence and flexibility really allows for staff to do Special Olympics, manage Special Olympics the way that they see it. And it’s allowed us to get a lot of different views on how Special Olympics works best. And I think that type of free thinking has grown Special Olympics.

It’s we’re not so structured that it has to be done this way. We learned the creativity of adaptive recreation. We do adaptive work here at Special Olympics, Texas. What does that mean adaptive?

It means finding the solutions, finding a way to say yes. If you’ve got an athlete that can’t climb down the ladder in the pool, what access points do we have? We’ve got athletes who have vision impairments, but they want to play bocce. And if you’re familiar with bocce, but it’s Italian lawn bowling. And so being able to ring a bell where the Polina is so that they have an idea of where to roll their ball, it’s all about being adaptive, being ready to make changes that allow somebody to participate. And that’s what we do is staff is find ways to open up Special Olympics to the greater community.

Anthony Codispoti: I like that. You gave that specific example. And I’m wondering if maybe there’s a specific story that you can share about an athlete who you saw a particular breakthrough or transformation to kind of highlight what Special Olympics can do for folks.

Sarah Haines: One of my just favorite stories was 2018, excuse me, 2014 was going to the Special Olympics USA Games in New Jersey. I got the opportunity to be one of the heads of delegation for the state of Arizona.

So pleased. It was early on in my career with Special Olympics. And we were bringing around 47 athletes and coaches to New Jersey to represent. And one of our track athletes was from a very small town in Arizona. They did not have a track that that you could compete on it didn’t have lines. He basically ran in the dirt.

And so but he wanted to be in a track athlete, he applied, he got selected, and he trained, but he trained in the dirt. And our goal was just so that he could stay in his lanes. That was that was all we wanted to do. We didn’t think he was going to win a medal, but we wanted as long as he doesn’t get disqualified.

We’re good. And he went out there and ran his race, got silver medal. I had very little to do with it. And I’m just weeping, weeping like a baby, because here is somebody that never thought they’d have this opportunity. And he was quiet, he was shy. And to see him get that silver medal, and he strutted around New Jersey with this silver medal. He’s so proud. And it just changed him in this travel from being this quiet person to look what I did. And to know that that just the attention from his coaches from myself, from his family, from his fellow athletes, to just get him to a place where he could succeed. And then he blew his, his, our, our, all our hopes out of the water just really succeeded. And that that was one of the most amazing things that I’ve gotten to be a part of at Special Olympics.

Anthony Codispoti: That’s such a cool story. Are there ever opportunities to employ folks with intellectual disabilities within Special Olympics? Or would that be maybe more of like a volunteer opportunity that would exist?

Sarah Haines: No, absolutely. One of the things that Special Olympics is really known for is promoting opportunities for people with intellectual disabilities. Here in Texas, we have a Special Olympics athlete who works for us. His name is Bruce Clark. He is our athlete engagement manager. His focus has always been athlete employment. And he’s taken opportunities to train athletes on how to write a resume, how to interview. He’s worked with companies to provide interview opportunities and experience with that feedback that says, this is, this is what you should wear.

When you get asked this question, how would you like to respond? And so he’s really focused on seeing more opportunities like himself. So often, and there’s nothing wrong with some of these opportunities, but so often we see people with intellectual disabilities being janitors or baggers at the grocery store. And those are wonderful opportunities to get out and to earn a living.

But what we always say at Texas is, we want real good, not feel good. And so it’s finding those opportunities. What is your potential? Where can you go?

What do you want to do? When I first met Bruce, he was very quiet. He didn’t like the way his voice sounded. And so he asked if he could not talk on the phone.

And our CEO, Tim Martin, said, your only job is going to be calling donors and thanking them for their time as specialists, because you will get used to speaking. And now Bruce talks all the time. There is no getting over Bruce, sharing his story. He has, he’s given speeches in front of 1200 individuals. He goes into penitentiaries and prisons and shares his story with the inmates there as part of the law enforcement torch run. And seeing what being given that opportunity has done for Bruce encourages the rest of us to see that our athletes have potential that we just need to give them the opportunity to show us what they want to do.

Anthony Codispoti: Can you maybe give us some more specific examples like Bruce there where, I don’t know, like, because I think we could all kind of use a little broadening of our horizons here. What are some job opportunities that could be a good fit for some of the athletes?

Sarah Haines: So a lot of our athletes with autism, they find repetitive actions to be, feels good. They know what, you know, once they are showing what to do, they are very happy with being a part of that process and doing those things. So working at restaurants can be very helpful for people with intellectual disabilities.

They will come every day. They will do exactly what they’re asked to do, whether that’s stocking shelves, cleaning the restaurants, working with the cooks in the back, given tasks that they are shown how to do, the patience of the individuals around us to recognize that just like you and I would ask for help or ask somebody, do you need help, knowing that those people with intellectual disabilities, they need us to ask them if they need help, not to assume that they do. That’s a really great place for folks to work. One of our partners here in Texas, they work with people with disabilities getting contracts on military bases.

There are a lot of work on bases that can be done with minimal supervision, with minimal training, and so finding just opportunities for the athletes to know what they want to do and then getting that chance. One of our other partners is Dell and they do amazing things with the technology that and how do they adapt, what they provide, the tools that they have so that individuals with disabilities can utilize the technology that you and I take for granted, whether that has to do with special buttons on the back of a computer so that you can tell what cord goes where, the frame speed on a computer so that it can’t trigger an epileptic seizure. There really is some amazing things that companies are doing to support the opportunities of people with disabilities and so really it’s just again finding out what is your interest, what do you want to do, and then how do I get you to be there.

Anthony Codispoti: My wife works as a speech therapist for preschoolers, kindergartners here in the local school district and she is so excited the last few years about these devices that they’ve been able to get a number of their students who are non-verbal to be you know kind of type in words or find symbols that help to communicate their thoughts and feels. Is this the kind of thing that you’re talking about?

Sarah Haines: Absolutely and I go back to that keyword of adaptive. It’s not just Special Olympics. I see that the world at large is learning that there we can make small changes that allow others to be a part of what we’re doing and so finding ways to help those who can’t communicate in a traditional way communicate with us, finding ways for people who can’t compete in a traditional team maybe because they’ve got some behavior issues or sensory issues, finding ways to say yes you can be a part of Special Olympics, finding a way to say yes I think is one of the most important things that we can do as a society when it relates to people with disabilities.

Anthony Codispoti: Since we’re talking about tech is there a particular tech tool, a piece of software or framework that is really helpful for you in doing your work?

Sarah Haines: So we worked with Toyota recently at one of our summer games. They were developing a program that would allow individuals that needed extra assistance almost like Uber but for volunteers for help and so our athletes if they were at one venue and needed to get to another venue they could use their phone to send a message to a selected group of volunteers who were prepared to go and assist them with what they needed and that was really intriguing for us to see because so often our athletes and our families you know they take on a lot, they have a lot of challenges and so using this piece of technology with Toyota learning in a testing phase how does this help if somebody’s needs to have put up their tent and they’re just two people and they need a couple others to come and help and so we really like the opportunity to partner with emerging technologies to find out what they how they want to serve the population because we’ve got this great population that wants to learn and they want to help others get to where they are so we’re pretty fortunate that way.

Anthony Codispoti: Sarah you have reached a level of success in your career that I think many would aspire to. Can you share some key decisions or actions that have led to you attaining this role?

Sarah Haines: I think for me I have always been worried about failing that’s you know I’ve always wanted to be successful I was one of these kids that in school that got straight A’s and you know if I didn’t get an A something wasn’t right so I oftentimes only took on those challenges I knew I could succeed at and what I learned at Special Olympics is that But that’s not the path to true success. And so I really took the opportunity here at Special Olympics to say, I’m going to try it out. Maybe I’m great at it, maybe I’m not, but I’m going to get an opportunity to learn. And I had the luck of working with some great mentors and like I said, our CEO, Tim Martin, he has always had such great faith in his staff.

And so if we come up with a crazy idea, he says, great, go for it. Let me know how it goes. Failure is always an option as long as you learn from it. And so really just being willing to take chances to recognize that I may not be great at this now, but I won’t know unless I try.

I won’t know unless I get the help from other folks how to do something. And so I really take that on whenever I look at a challenge and think, oh, I can’t do that. It’s, you know what, if somebody has faith in me that I can, maybe I can. And I like to take that same attitude when I work with the staff that report to me is, you know, hear what they want to do, get them excited, and then let them do it and then see where it comes from that. More often than not, we start to see success as we build our confidence and confidence in that. And your belief that you can do it is really, I think, the key to success.

Anthony Codispoti: I love this. You know, one of the things that I often remind myself of and try to teach my kids is that life is not meant to be a spectator sport.

Get in the game. And I think this is sort of a neat metaphor with, you know, you being in charge of special Olympics, Texas. And, you know, what you just shared with us there and your answer, which basically the same thought process is, I don’t know if I could do this, but I’m not going to know unless I get in there and I try it. Like, let’s get in. I want to be part of the game. Yeah, I.

Sarah Haines: One of the biggest parts of Special Olympics are the victory dances. Some athletes, this is why they come to competition. So after the competition is over, everybody gets together. We play music and everybody dances. And I used to remember those junior high dances where you had boys on one side and girls on the other and nobody ever met together. And by first experience at a Special Olympics dance was everybody was dancing. And if you were off to the side, somebody pulled you in and they seemed to know every new dance. They had all the steps down and they were so excited to just so joyful to be alive.

And to be a part of what they were doing and pulling you in. And so I always find that thought of, you know, why can’t dance or I, you know, not comfortable with this or I’m not sure I can do it. And seeing, you know, athletes say, hey, come here, come dance with me and pulling you in and encouraging you to try to not care what people think, not care if people are looking at you just to try just to be a part. And that has made such a difference in my life is just to try.

Anthony Codispoti: Have you ever found the need to encourage more participation from the athletes? Is there a time where maybe they’re resistant to get involved? Absolutely.

Sarah Haines: One of the things that have gotten to do is to partner with other organizations. And we were looking for some fundraising opportunities in order to travel to a USA Games in New Jersey and came across the Highland Games.

If you’re familiar, that’s where they wear the kilts and they throw the CABRE, the big telephone poles and the hammers and all of that. And they invited our Special Olympics team to come out and participate in the Highland Games. And so I brought some of our athletes out and there was a young lady, she was one of our swimmers. And she, very small petite, dainty little princess girl.

And one of the Highland athletes was a lady in her kilts. Let’s throw this CABRE. And our athlete, Christie, said, I can’t do that. I can’t look at how big that is. I can’t do that. And this Highland athlete said, people said, I couldn’t do it because I was a woman, but I do it. So let’s get this going.

And the encouragement to try something new. And this tiny five foot nothing athlete got in there, grabbed the CABRE and gave it a heave. And I looked at that and said, look at what she’s doing.

I mean, look the accomplishment of this. And so, yeah, sometimes, you know, we need to be reminded that what looks to be too big for us, if we take it with the encouragement of others, becomes just the right size. And so I try to remember when I think something like, nope, nope, that’s above and beyond me. That, again, if somebody’s encouraging me to do it, I’m willing to give it a shot. And so you really need those positive people around you to be successful. And that’s really what things like this have taught me.

Anthony Codispoti: I love that example. How heavy are these things? That this little five foot woman was.

Sarah Haines: So she got one of the smaller CABREs. But yeah, they’re over a couple hundred pounds. But if what you learn, the proper form to do it, then, you know, really, it’s just a matter of having the heart to do it. And again, that’s with the encouragement of the folks around you. And the kill doesn’t hurt either. And so they gave us some kills to wear that does seem to make a difference.

Anthony Codispoti: Yeah, you got to get in character. You got to do the whole thing. What role do volunteers play in Special Olympics?

Sarah Haines: That is a great question because they play the biggest role. The things that folks seem to misunderstand about Special Olympics is that all of the coaches that you see out at competitions, that you hear about training these athletes, they are all volunteers. We do not pay anybody to coach at Special Olympics. These are all folks that are coming from the community that see a need that that want to help these athletes, whether they’re family members, law enforcement teachers at the school. They all come in and support these athletes 365 days a year. There really are amazing what these coaches coaches are willing to do because they very often have full time jobs elsewhere. We utilize a little over 50,000 volunteers every year here in the state of Texas, whether that’s a coach, a chaperone, a driver, or that somebody that’s helping us put on the competition. So members of the community can come out and volunteer to be a timer, a scorekeeper, an awards presenter, which, like I said, is always the best without volunteers. Special Olympics wouldn’t be able to do anything that it does. Does everyone get an award?

No, that’s another key thing. I’ve seen this. There was a TV show about some singing high schoolers and they made a joke at one point about what Special Olympics. Everybody gets a gold medal and that tends to be the biggest surprise for volunteers when they come to Special Olympics is that this is true competition. You come out, you train for eight to 10 weeks in your sport, you compete and maybe you win gold.

That’s great. Or maybe you get an eighth place ribbon or maybe you get disqualified because you didn’t do the stroke correctly in a swim. We treat these athletes like athletes and that means respecting the hard work they’ve put in. It’s not about here everybody gets a medal. It’s about everybody gets an opportunity to compete. That’s what’s unique with Special Olympics is that unlike the traditional Olympics, when you think of, say, the 100 meter breaststroke and that you have all of these prelims and semifinals and then the finals and then you have one winner who is the fastest at that stroke. At Special Olympics, we heat and division by age, gender and ability. And so with the 100 meter breaststroke, we might have 20 heats of that particular stroke at that particular distance and each of those heats is going to have a gold medal winner, a silver, a bronze. We try to heat to eight places and so everybody has that opportunity to be successful regardless of their age, their gender or their ability, but also you have the opportunity to not win. And that’s a life lesson that’s what sports teaches all of us regardless of our intellectual abilities.

Anthony Codispoti: Do you find that when an athlete does not get a medal, maybe gets that eighth place ribbon or maybe gets disqualified because they didn’t do the stroke correctly? Is their emotional reaction a bigger one than it might? I don’t like to lose. Like, you know, I’ve got a neurotypical son who plays competitive sports and he doesn’t like to lose. And there are like big feelings to deal with. Do you find that it’s an even bigger emotion that comes out from the experience or are folks generally happy to have had the experience? Paint me a picture because I haven’t had the privilege to attend the Special Olympics before.

Sarah Haines: So I think the common misconception is that these folks are all happy and it’s all great sportsmanship and they are cheering on each other the entire time. And yes, that absolutely happens. But these are also competitors and they know what they want. They’ve trained to be successful. And when they don’t win, they have the opportunity like the rest of us to be brave in the attempt as the athlete oath states and applaud the winner of the gold medal and to say, you know, I’m going to do better next time.

I learned something from this. They also have the opportunity to rip that ribbon right off their neck, put it on the ground, stomp on it because that’s not what they wanted. It’s just like they’re human beings, just like the rest of us. Some can take defeat gracefully and some are highly competitive and it’s just not acceptable to not have won. And that’s the beauty of sport is that you get your triumphs that teach you things, but you get your defeats that teach you something as well. And our athletes are just the same way.

Anthony Codispoti: Are volunteers receive any sort of training for, I don’t know, how to help console in situations like that? Or are you just sort of drawing on like your experience of being a human being, you know?

Sarah Haines: That’s exactly it. One of the things that I’ve had the opportunity to do, one of my again, my favorite places to volunteer and work at competitions is at awards. Most people are mostly happy at awards.

You get to see some of the biggest smiles and you get to see the pride regardless of the place of the athlete, the pride on their family’s faces. And we use a lot of law enforcement in our awards areas. The athletes are very proud to have an officer in full uniform present their award to them. And I find the officers very much know and can connect with these athletes.

So when somebody is unhappy about the place that they got, I’ve witnessed officers from every type of agency be able to pull that athlete aside and talk to them about sometimes you win. Did you try your hardest? Did you have fun?

Will you try again next time? And when you get those yeses and you get that positive reinforcement, we find that the athletes tend to understand and are able to ready to go on to the next. Unlike traditional athletes who focus on one sport and that’s where they excel, many of our athletes compete in nearly every sport the Special Olympics offers because they’re competing year round. So they may start in swimming in the fall and move on to bowling and then they’ll play volleyball, cycling and track and field. So they do it all. They can’t afford to be stuck on that one loss because they’ve got the next competition to look forward to. So they have the short memories that are necessary for athletes. Right?

Anthony Codispoti: I like that. What’s the best way to attract more volunteers? What have you found to be most effective?

Sarah Haines: So getting the information out there, sharing what we can do. People don’t volunteer because they haven’t been asked. We find that getting the information out, letting people know how they can be a part of the competition. It’s not overwhelming because our competition are, they typically last a day. Our volunteer shifts last anywhere from four to six hours. We find lots of people sign up for multiple shifts so they can stay the whole day. But you get that opportunity to come out, learn the sport, learn what type of volunteering you’ll be doing, and then you get in there and you’re doing it.

And as I usually share with our volunteers, the athletes know this sport. They’ll help you if you’re not sure of an answer. They’ll tell you what you need to know. So we are able to bring in, like I said, thousands of volunteers who don’t need prior training to come in and help being starters on the track or help with hydration, things that are really simple. With our coaches and those individuals who spend more direct one-on-one time with our athletes, we really look for individuals who know the sport. They go through coaches’ trainings.

They get certified. We do concussion training. We do protect behaviors.

All the things to protect a vulnerable population. And these folks are just masters at the sport that they do. And they often are certified in multiple sports because, again, their athletes not just doing swimming. They’re doing swimming and flag football and basketball and golf. So they’ve got to learn multiple sports.

Anthony Codispoti: Let me ask you a personal parenting question. This is something that came up maybe within the past year. I’ve got two boys who are ages eight and 10. And they have a cousin with Down syndrome that they hadn’t seen for years because of COVID. So they didn’t remember him. And we were all at a family wedding together. And their cousin is roughly the same age, I don’t know, maybe a year or two older. And so they sort of found each other and started playing together.

And, you know, the next day when we were together, my wife asked my boys, you know, you guys were having fun playing with your cousin last night. Like, oh, yeah, he was great. He was funny.

He made us laugh. And she was like, you know, did you notice anything different about him? And they’re like, what do you mean? And she kind of left it at that. Because we weren’t sure what to say or how to say it. Like, maybe you can give some assistance here. Like, what would be sort of the right teaching thing to do there?

Sarah Haines: Well, I think that it sounds like you guys handled it pretty well in terms of if the child doesn’t ask, if the child doesn’t say they’re strange, mommy, or I don’t know what’s going on with them, that they just recognize them as an individual. And that’s fantastic. But the trick is to, I think, share the information openly, be honest about what the child is seeing. It doesn’t serve to don’t talk about that. Don’t don’t look at them because that’s more isolating to the individual. You have questions. Go up and ask them what’s going on. I noticed I noticed that ask their cousin directly.

Anthony Codispoti: Absolutely. The person with Down syndrome. OK. Absolutely.

Sarah Haines: How can we help them phrase the questions appropriately?

Sarah Haines: It’s I think a lot about common courtesy. So, you know, when you’re playing a game and somebody is having difficulty learning the game or they’re slower, instead of taking over and pulling the things from them so that you can help them, can I help you with the game? Do you have any questions? Are we having fun? Get encouraging them to find out where that person is at, where that individual, that cousin is at. What do you need from me to make this fun to bring you into what we’re doing? It’s normalizing people with disabilities being a part of our community.

And that’s why I think unified sports is changing our culture in such a dynamic way. When I was in school and back in the 80s and 90s, if there were people with intellectual disabilities at my school, I never saw them. They must have been in a room somewhere else. They weren’t a part of our school culture. And as I got up through the work environments, I didn’t see a lot of people with disabilities. And so when I got to Special Olympics and saw individuals with disabilities, I was nervous. What am I going to say that’s wrong?

Am I going to embarrass myself? Maybe I just not engage because I don’t want to say or do the wrong thing. And through unified sports and getting these opportunities through schools to pair individuals with and without disabilities together on the same teams, it becomes normal. These are individuals in your community. And as you get older and you graduate from school and you get into the workforce, having somebody with a disability isn’t uncomfortable. It’s not unusual. Hey, that’s just like Johnny. I used to play basketball with him. This is this is going to be great.

I, you know, we can have a lot of fun together. And so as this movement grows, more and more businesses, more and more employees are going to be comfortable with people with disabilities. And that’s what I think is the biggest thing that keeps people with disabilities from getting into the workforce. Is it that they can’t do the job? It’s that a lot of folks in hiring positions and leadership are afraid to say and do the wrong thing.

So it’s just easier to not engage. And so we’re trying to teach that you engage with these individuals the way you would anybody else. You’re going to say some wrong things and you’re going to get corrected and you’re going to learn. And when you learn, then you don’t do it again. And so that’s, that’s the best thing I can say is just to get as much exposure and learn as much as you can, because when it’s not scary, it’s not unknown, then it’s commonplace and you’re comfortable with it.

Anthony Codispoti: I like that. Just, I mean, sort of like we were saying before, life isn’t a spectator sport. Just get in there. Just do it. Exactly. Just be a part of it and go with it. Yeah. And you’re going to make mistakes and that’s okay. If you go in with a good heart and good intentions, people are going to help you. Right.

Sarah Haines: Absolutely. I, you know, we found athletes that have difficulty expressing themselves, communicating and so mumbling their words or not being clear with their addiction and how many times we have a tendency just to smile and nod. Yes.

Yes. And not realizing what you’re potentially saying yes to and learning that that can cause the frustration because you’re trying to share what you’re thinking and the other person isn’t catching it. And so being willing to say, I’m sorry, I don’t understand what you’re saying.

Can you say it slower? Or did you just mean this being willing to take the time to build that communication? It’s more difficult. It can be embarrassing when you can’t figure out what the other person’s trying to communicate, but it’s worth the time. What they have to say to you is worth your time and trying to figure it out. And that, I think if you keep that in your mind that they’ve put their energy into you, give it back, learn what they want to tell you because it’s important to them. I think it just makes you a better person.

Anthony Codispoti: Sorry, I want to shift gears here. And in my experience anyways, growth oftentimes comes from the biggest challenges that we’ve faced in our lives. I’m curious to hear about a serious challenge that you’ve overcome. Maybe it’s personal or professional or a combination of the two. What was that like? And what did you learn going through that?

Sarah Haines: So like a lot of folks, 2020 and COVID, it was tough. Isolating, particularly in an industry that was all about connection. It was all about being with the athletes and knowing that suddenly we couldn’t be with each other. I found that to be very difficult and personally fell into a rather deep depression that affected my ability to even function at work, losing interest in the things that were important to me because I just fell into this voice in my head telling me that things were bad and that I wasn’t good enough, was really hard. And the way that I overcame that and I continue to overcome is by willing to be open to share what’s going on.

When it’s dark, when it’s scary, when you feel bad about yourself, it’s easy to not want to tell anybody about that because I don’t want anybody to know that I’m not great. I feel like I’ve got to be on. I’m smiling. I’m happy.

I’m this great successful business person, but inside I’m cringing and it took being willing to say, I’m not okay. I need help. And that was a big struggle. I have always been the helper. I managed volunteers. I want to help people and was very hard to accept the help myself, but I had some really great friends that shared. Sarah, think about how the athletes you work with, how they ask for help.

How do they interact? How do they get through those dark moments? And are you okay with saying you’re not okay? Are you okay with saying, you know what, I’m just like you. I’ve got these issues. Let me help me. And that was probably the biggest turning point was being willing to tell people, you know what, I’m not okay.

I need help. And there are so many people in our lives who are prepared to drop everything and help you as soon as you let them know that you’re struggling. And I was very fortunate to find that in my life and through my work and are some athletes that shared why I was important to them, reminded me why this is what I want to do. And I started to get that spark of interest back in the things that I was doing.

And then we started in person competitions again. And the reminder that the energy that you get from the positive people that you’re around makes a difference. And so, yeah, sometimes I still get that I’m just not good enough. I, what am I doing?

I’m letting everybody down. And then you get these opportunities to find people in your life who give you that, that push, that energy that, you know, thank you for being in my life and it can change it for you. And that’s, that’s, that’s what I count on every day is the people around me to, to help me the same way that I want to help them.

Anthony Codispoti: I’m really glad that you shared this story, Sarah, because I think it’s a really common experience for folks and they don’t realize it because so few people talk about it. You know, when, when we’re struggling, I say we, because we all go through it. We’ve all been through it. We’ve all been there.

And the time where you need that human connection, where you need help the most ironically is the time where it’s hardest to reach out and to ask for it. And so when you found yourself in this dark place, what was it? How did you take that first hard step? What did it look like?

Sarah Haines: So that, and this is, as I look back slightly cowardly way to take that first step, but I’m going to own it. Was to email my CEO. You know what? Hey, I’m struggling a little bit. I’ll get it all back on track. Don’t you worry, because that was my, my, my go to is don’t you, I’ve got this.

And he responded immediately with, you need to take a break. You need to find that joy again. Don’t worry.

We’ve got you. And I had a little breakdown because if I’m not doing this, what am I doing? Um, but it was somebody who, somebody who, who I respect, somebody who I, who knows me, who I appreciate, who appreciates me that said, let’s take a break.

Let’s get you right. Don’t keep trying to power through, stop and get yourself spend some time healing, spend some time getting yourself where you need to be, because you’re too important not to have around. And that, that really made the difference was somebody calling me on my, my, my, my lies, my, everything’s good.

Anthony Codispoti: My act, absolutely. Um, and, and having that, somebody willing to tell me the hard truths, you’re not okay and we can tell.

Sarah Haines: Um, and that’s, that’s a tough thing to hear and a tough thing to accept. Um, but if you’re not honest with yourself about where you are and where you want to be, then, um, then it will all come falling apart. And so learning to be honest with myself and with those around me, uh, that was the first step is, is, is just saying it and getting it out.

Anthony Codispoti: I think for a lot of people, part of the struggle is you don’t even know what you’re asking for. I’m hurting. I feel isolated. I feel alone. I’ve, this is a dark place for me. What do I do? Like what, what, okay. I, I, I reach out, I call you, what am I asking for? You know, did you fall into that?

Sarah Haines: Yeah, absolutely. Um, because you people have a tendency to, when they hear I need help, let me fix it. And sometimes that help is just having somebody say, talk to me. Tell me what’s going on. Let me understand where you’re at. Sometimes you just need to get it out. You don’t want somebody to step in and say, here’s what you need to do. You need somebody to say, let’s hear what you have to say, uh, get it out. And that was the beauty of, of, and from such a surprising place, honestly, uh, you know, a CEO who’s managing a business to stop and say, tell me what’s going on.

I just want to hear it. He didn’t try to fix it for me. He just wanted to hear where I was, uh, and give me the opportunity to figure out what I needed. Uh, and that’s the key thing I think is, is finding those folks who are willing to not fix it for you that just want to listen.

Uh, because sometimes that’s all you need. You, you want to figure it out yourself. You need those folks to be the sounding board and not the, here’s what you, you should have done this because that’s not always as helpful as you hope it’ll be. So learning that and learning that with, with the athletes that I work with is that I can’t fix it for them.

They don’t, they don’t need to be fixed. Sometimes they just want that opportunity. They just want to be heard. And so trying to translate those things that really helped me into how can I help my athletes? And that’s just by being that person that hears what they need and, and helps to get them to communicate it so that we can all get what we need.

Anthony Codispoti: You know, I think, um, one of the most underrated things when you’re in a position like that is just the power of safe human connection. Right. Like you said, you didn’t need somebody to fix it for you, but it meant the world to have somebody just listen and to be able to share it with somebody. There’s something, I don’t know, almost magical that takes place when we allow that to happen.

Sarah Haines: That’s absolutely where I think, um, the honesty within, uh, the disability community can come about is that, uh, this is a group of people who have faced challenges, potentially their entire lives. Uh, and we tend to think that they are heroes for just facing these challenges. But in reality, they’re just normal human beings going through the same challenges that, that, that we all go through. And so being honest, being willing to talk with each other, accepting their experiences as they accept mine, uh, help build those human connections, um, that are true, uh, and that do get you through some of those darker times. Yeah.

Anthony Codispoti: And you know, one thing I’ve learned in communicating with my wife is when we start talking about something, uh, and I don’t do this often enough. So this is a good reminder for me. I will ask, are you looking for help to fix this? Do you want an ear or a hug? And it could be, you know, some combination of all of those three things because the way I’m wired, right, I want to come in and I want to fix it. Oh, you’re telling me this thing cause you need my help fixing this. And that’s not always the case. Frequently not the case. Yeah.

Sarah Haines: Yeah. I mean, a lot of us are programmed to be solution based, right? Everything we hear this, here’s a problem. Here’s the solution. Uh, and one of the things that I’ve learned, uh, through working, uh, with this population is like I said, they’re not, they’re not broken. They don’t need to be fixed. Uh, I, we just need to adapt to each other to have this better connection. And so learning that, that not everything is a problem. Uh, some things just are, and we get to experience it the way that it is and learn from that. Uh, it, it’s a different way of thinking, a different way of living. No.

Anthony Codispoti: Um, sorry, I’ve just got one more question for you, but before I ask it, I want to do two things for everyone listening today. You like today’s content, please hit the follow button on your favorite podcast app so you can get more great content like what Sarah has shared here with us today. I also am going to let folks know the best way to get in touch with you in special Olympics, Texas. It’s S O T X. dot org.

Just four letters to remember S O T X. Dot org. Um, you can find, I’m assuming volunteer opportunities, opportunities to donate, uh, as well as to just reach out and connect with the staff there. So last question I have for you, Sarah, is as you look to the future, what are some of the things that you’re most excited about for special Olympics?

Sarah Haines: So, uh, there is so much opportunity, uh, at special Olympics, uh, that it’s almost too exciting because there’s so much to be able to do. Uh, I love that we are focused on opportunities for more female athletes, uh, to compete in the team sports, to get those same opportunities, uh, that their male counterparts often do. Uh, we’re really working on, uh, the health aspects. Um, we all know that there is an obesity, uh, problem in this country and, uh, a lot of our athletes, uh, they tend to have more solitary, sedentary lives because they don’t potentially work.

They don’t have an opportunity to get out. And so we’re really excited to bring more health opportunities, learning about nutrition, learning about, uh, substance abuse and how to avoid it, learning about hydration and sun safety and all the things that, uh, go into being a healthy athlete. Um, and knowing that we can really bring that, uh, information and that education, uh, to these athletes who are ready and looking for those opportunities. Um, education, finding ways to make every campus a unified campus, uh, is so key. Um, too often we hear about these horrible acts of violence on school campuses and we wonder, you know, what’s, how do we stop this?

How do, you know, what’s going on? Uh, and we find that these schools that embrace unified, uh, that embrace a culture of acceptance across the campus have reduced acts of violence on their campus, reduce the amount of bullying that happens. We see attendance rates go up. And so getting to be a part of seeing how special Olympics can improve education for everybody, neuro typical, neuro divergent students. Uh, it’s an exciting place to be. Uh, and we know that there’s so much more that we can learn.

Um, but we have, we have the resources we have, the human beings that can help give us this information. People want to be involved and we’re excited to let them know how to attach themselves to special Olympics, uh, because it really is a place for everybody.

Anthony Codispoti: Sarah, I want to be the first one to thank you for sharing both your time and your story with us today. I really appreciate it.

Sarah Haines: Thank you so much for having me. I had a blast.

Anthony Codispoti: Folks, that’s a wrap on another episode of the inspired stories podcast. Thanks for learning with us today.