At Macon’s Rutland High School, athletic director Steven Gunn’s job is to oversee the school’s dozens of athletic programs, with its numerous coaches and student athletes. For Gunn and Amanda Maddox, head softball coach and head of the school’s physical education program, that includes access for every student, regardless of ability.
“My primary goal as the athletic director here is to make sure that Rutland High School athletics are all-inclusive,” Gunn told us recently. Fortunately for Gunn, he has a great support person in Maddox, who helps him make sure every student does indeed have the opportunity to play sports.
“We refer to our special needs kids as our ‘Access’ kids,” Gunn said, explaining how the process works to make sure the all-inclusive goals are met. “Each day, we have a fifth period class that is our Best Buddies class. That’s a P.E. class that includes our Access kids and some of our general education students.”
Coach Maddox oversees and teaches the Best Buddies class at Rutland High. Gunn said the class operates on a 1-to-1 ratio of general education students paired with Access students. They participate on the same team, and several times during the year, the Best Buddies class competes with and against Best Buddies classes from several other middle Georgia schools in the Unified Sports program.
Gunn said Coach Maddox took the Best Buddies program to a different level.
“Coach Maddox began having a ‘Best Buddies Night’ during the season,” he explained.
That was a night when the Access kids could come out and play the national anthem and read the starting lineups. Inspired by the sports environment and the experience of being on the field, three Rutland High Access students began playing varsity sports.
They are Paige Steel, who plays basketball; McKenzie Scott, a member of the school’s cheerleading squad; and Brian Krietzer, who graduated after being a member of Rutland’s football and tennis teams all four years of his high school career.
The Access kids didn’t always get to see a lot of action on the field, but Gunn and Maddox were determined to change that. The way they saw it, inclusive should mean actually being included to play, so Maddox decided to make that happen.
In a softball game against Jordan High School from Columbus last fall, Maddox learned that Jordan’s team had an Access student on its roster. She approached the Jordan coach to ask if the Access player could have an at-bat.
“It was during a rain delay, and their coach and I began talking, and he told me they had an Access player who was on the team but had not had a chance to play all season,” Maddox recalled. “So I asked him if he would mind if we pitched to her and would allow her the chance to hit, and, of course, he agreed that it was a great idea.”
Maddox said her players understood what was happening, and the at-bat resulted in a home run.
“That was the first time she had a chance to play all season,” Maddox said proudly.
Maddox said that was so much fun, they decided to do it again when Jordan came to Rutland to play.
“That same player actually started and ended the game that day,” Maddox recalled.
“She ended up going 2-for-2 with a home run in both at-bats,” Gunn said.
As Gunn explained, the Rutland High emphasis on access is what it means to “walk the walk and talk the talk.”
“This was just another example of Rutland backing up what we mean by being all-inclusive,” Gunn said. “Coach Maddox stepped up and made a great gesture. It’s all about providing every kid here at Rutland – and other schools, too – a chance to play just like every other kid.”
Gunn added that this will become the norm when any team with an Access student visits Rutland High School.
