Abilities Unleashed - Tasmania Term 4 Wrap-Up
[Image ID - a child wheelchair user enjoying themselves playing badminton on an indoor court. The child is lifting both their arms up in the sky and open mouth smiling. Behind the child are more children with disabilities being active at an Abilities Unleashed Kids day.]
In 2023, we had the pleasure of visiting Tasmania four times to deliver six Abilities Unleashed events. Seeing the smiles and joy on everyone’s faces made our team so excited that they were counting down the days until they returned.
Abilities Unleashed events are one day programs designed to promote the pathways for inclusive sport and active recreation programs in local community areas and encourage people with disabilities to participate in community sport and active recreation on a regular basis.
These events provide a platform for local providers to connect to people with disabilities in their area. Across our days in Devonport, Hobart, and Tasmania, our participants were showcased opportunities from:
These days wouldn’t have been possible without the delivery of these sports, support from local councils City of Hobart, City of Launceston, and Devonport City Council, and from our Major Partner MatchWorks throughout the year.
Local Legend - David Patten - LSSSA
[Image ID - a photo of David at a Launceston Abilities Unleashed Kids day. David is in the front right of the image wearing a black t-shirt and sunglasses. Behind David is a tennis court with a group of kids and carers preparing for an activity.]
Our Abilities Unleashed events in Tasmania finished on an extraordinary high.
Earlier this year in March, we ventured to Launceston. 11 students from one school came to the day. We were fortunate that their supervisor was David Patten. David is the President of the Launceston State Schools Sports Association (LSSSA) - a not-for-profit association dedicated to enabling students from Launceston’s government Primary Schools to be the best they can be and have fun through Health and Physical Education activities.
Seeing our day in action, David expressed how he had similar visions of bringing a disability sports day to Launceston. He offered that he could help us connect to more people if delivered another day in Launceston at the end the year. With the support of David, in November we returned to our biggest ever event in Tasmania. 120 children with disabilities from eight schools came to play eight local adaptive sports. It was incredible to see so many smiles on this sunny Friday in Launceston.
Observing David walk around the activities, you can see how connected he is to the community. He is a very likeable guy. Everyone on the day will at some stage talk to him with his approachable nature, and he will likely make you laugh with his hilarious humour. Beneath this is an inclusive passion for everyone to be active and enjoy themselves.
Disability Sports Australia thanks David for his tremendous work behind-the-scenes for helping us bring this day to life.
Featured below are a small collection of our favourite photos from our 2023 Tasmania Abilities Unleashed events.
If you wish to find more from these days, please contact: max@sports.org.au
[Image ID - a collection of images from Disability Sports Australia’s Abilities Unleashed days in Tasmania in 2023. Featured are people with disabilities being active in a wide range of sports.]
