By Siena Oliver, ’27

Opinions Editor

Each winter, from January through late April, the PAC Penguins Special Olympics Swim Team returns for another season. Every Sunday morning from 10:00-11:30 at the Emilson YMCA in Hanover, the team gathers to practice. High school volunteers work with swimmers on a variety of goals, including improving swim strokes, building endurance, comfort level in the water, and offering overall encouragement. At the end of the season, after many weeks of practice, all of the swimmers come together for a culminating swim meet hosted at a nearby college pool. With a banquet/party to celebrate at the end, the Penguins’ swim season is jam packed with activity and fun. This team offers exercise, community, competition, and friendship to local swimmers with special needs. It also provides volunteers with the opportunity to not only earn community service hours, but also build meaningful connections with swimmers, volunteers, and coaches alike, while making a difference in a way that is rewarding and very enjoyable. 

Founded in 1968, Special Olympics is an organization that holds training and competition in a variety of sports for children and adults with intellectual disabilities. According to its mission statement, the program gives participants “continuing opportunities to develop physical fitness, demonstrate courage, experience joy and participate in a sharing of gifts, skills and friendship with their families, other Special Olympics athletes and the community.”

I joined as a volunteer during my freshman year of high school, and enjoyed it so much I have returned every year since. I love meeting new swimmers at the beginning of the season, but I always especially look forward to reconnecting with returning swimmers who I’ve gotten to know in previous years. My role as a volunteer varies from week to week, but most often I am either overseeing a lane and offering encouragement and swimming tips, or getting in the water to work one-on-one with a swimmer who I’ve been helping for several seasons. I enjoy all of the different aspects of helping with the Penguins swim team, but one of the most powerful parts of this type of volunteer work is seeing the direct, positive impacts that volunteers can have on someone else. From week to week, and especially from year to year, the impacts that volunteers can have on the swimmers are visible. Helping someone learn a stroke they had been struggling with, or gain comfort with a skill they had previously been nervous about is a great feeling.

Volunteering with the Penguins has become a weekend activity that I genuinely enjoy and look forward to each year. It is an amazing opportunity for high school students to make connections with people in their communities, work with swimmers of all different ages and abilities, and, yes, fulfill their community service requirements. For anyone with an interest in swimming, teaching, meeting new people, making a difference in their community, I would highly recommend becoming a volunteer for the PAC Penguins Special Olympics Swim Team.

For more information on being a volunteer, visit the Special Olympics website or reach out to Sue Gaspar through the PAC Penguins website.