The competitive spirits of 150 special needs children from the Aiken, SC, school district will be high at this spring’s Special Olympics with some help from area nursing students.

Students at the University of South Carolina Aiken School of Nursing recently volunteered to conduct the children’s physical assessments, which are required of anyone participating in the Special Olympic games. The Aiken school district and Bill Boyce, the region’s Special Olympics volunteer coordinator, organized the project with the university.

The project may have provided ease for parents without the financial resources to take their child to a physician. And it also benefitted the volunteering nursing students, who normally encounter acutely ill patients in hospitals and were now able to hone their assessment skills on a new patient population.

Boyce expects to see an increase of about 400-500 student-level participants at the Special Olympics as a result of the project.

Source: aikenstandard.com