Disabled Archery USA

About Disabled Archery

By Glen Harris, Disabled Archery USA National Chairperson, U.S. Paralympic Team Coach 1996-2004

Over 50 million people in the United States live with one form of disability or another. Life for nearly 2 million of them involves using a wheelchair for mobility. For the foreseeable future, we will remain a human population with a significant percentage of people who have physical disabilities of various sorts. Everybody is entitled to full inclusion according to his or her true capabilities. We believe this so strongly that Congress established the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 that protects people with disabilities from discrimination by the federal government and their contractors. This includes any institution that receives federal funds.

In 1992 the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) took the process one step closer and mandated access to all public services, so that people with disabilities are entitled to full equal enjoyment of the goods, services, facilities, privileges, advantages, or accommodations of any place of public business. It guarantees freedom from discrimination and provides for expectation of "reasonable accommodation" to participate. In 1996, FITA (Federation Internationale Tir a l'Arc) began the process of establishing competition rules for archers with disabilities. I should add, in this author's opinion, they have done a marvelous job of simplifying and unifying tournament archery for disabled archers. My thanks and congratulations go to them for their insight and foresight.

The fact is that the sport of archery lends itself very well to the notion of "accommodation". The game, the equipment, and the venues, all aspects are so malleable that many of the physical rehabilitation centers around the world use archery as a source of recreation and rehabilitation for their patients. But that's another whole series of articles and discussions.

I want to discuss "elite level" or "tournament" archers with disabilities and provide some definitions to you about these athletes, so as to bring us closer to understanding what is expected by the archer, from the event organizer, and from coaches. The ADA does not provide "carte blanche" to any person with a disability to demand rights of participation. The "reasonable accommodation" term is actually a two-way street. For example, to accommodate a quadriplegic archer at a FITA field or a 3-D event would diminish the event for the able body participants such that the amount of accommodation required would not be "reasonable". However, at indoor and outdoor target events, that is a different matter.

The National Archery Association (NAA) has made a commitment to the U.S. Olympic Committee/U.S. Paralympics to act as the NGB (National Governing Body) on behalf of archers with disabilities. This is in recognition of the fact that these archers fully meet the criteria as developmental, emerging and elite level archers. For example, at the last Disabled World Championships ten FITA scores of 1300+ were posted and 110 to 113 passes in finals were not uncommon. That's competitive by any standard!

If what little I have written hasn't impressed you enough to continue reading this article then I challenge you to contact me. I assure you I have lots more I can share about how important it is for all of us, as archers, to understand each other.