Thank you for coming out to our first general meeting on Monday! To those who missed it, here is the recap.
Rutgers Empowering Disabilities strives to empower those with disabilities, promote acceptance, and spread awareness on disabilities through community service and entertainment. Our general interest meetings will be held biweekly on Mondays in Rutgers Student Center (coll ave) Room 402 at 8:10 pm.
Here is the basic information for the three events we are planning.
October 25th in RSC MPR approx 7:30pm: "Ice Cream Social" We are still looking for a creative name for this event so if you have any ideas let us know. The basic premise is that the featured event will be the ice cream sundae station in which people work as partners to create an ice cream sundae, however each person is given a disability which they must work through to make the sundae. For example, one person may be blind; the other may not be able to speak. The object of this is to show teamwork and to allow the students to see how working together allows them to overcome anything. We will also have a DJ at this event and are looking into the possibility of a guest speaker. For any organization wanting to co-sponsor or help out, we will have other stations (thinking of doing like a candy land theme) and each organization can be at a station providing both information about their group as well as snacks.
Film Screening of 'Defining Beauty'. We do not have the date yet for this event, but we are looking for sometime in November and are looking to screen the documentary 'Defining Beauty'. This is a documentary about the vibrant lives of five women with disabilities on their journey to the 2010 Ms. Wheelchair America pageant, where the concept of beauty is defined through the lens of advocacy & perseverance. We are hoping to get one of the actresses to come and speak.
February 5th: Wheelchair Relay Race - The third major event of the year, this is occurring next semester so we will go into more detail later on, however if you look on our website you can see a video of this event last year. The basic premise is to allow able bodied individuals a chance to see how being in a wheelchair feels, in a fun and friendly matter. They will be in teams of two and will perform a relay race, however they will be in the wheelchairs while doing so, both pushing themselves and their teammates to victory. DJ and potential guest speaker will be at this event as well.
In addition to these events we are planning ways in which we can help Rutgers be more disability friendly as well as find volunteering opportunities. We are looking into doing holiday cards and gift drives for Enable, Inc (a resident home for adults with disabilities).
We also have a couple e-board positions available:
Arts & Entertainment Coordinator - in charge of programing/events and getting guest speakers
Community Outreach Coordinator - researching/opening volunteer opportunities
Executive Assistants (2) - Assisting any of the officers and general members with events
Send us an email if you're interested in any of these position. Information on interviews and applying to one of these positions will be sent by this week only to those who are interested.
If you aren't interested in running for a position, we still want you to be involved! We are looking for all kinds of talents! At our next meeting, sign up sheet for joining different committees (PR, Fundraising, Programming) and/or helping out at our event will be passed around so please come by. If you can't attend and still want to join a committee, send us an email.
**Good opportunity - those who are interested in forming groups to compete in the upcoming event's flyer competition, we'll talk more in detail at the next meeting.
We look forward to seeing you all at the next meeting on Oct 3rd, RSC 402 at 8:10pm!