California State University, Northridge

October 18, 1996

Contact: Carmen Ramos Chandler,
(818) 677-2130
cchandler@exec.csun.edu

CSUN Launches Fundraising Drive for Special Aquatics Facility

Semester after semester, his dream existed only in an architect's drawing in CSUN's Center of Achievement for the Physically Disabled. But now, finally, it is closer to reality.

With strong backing from CSUN administrators, staff, community leaders and volunteers, Britten, the center's founder and director, has launched a fund-raising drive to raise $1.5 million to add a state-of-the-art adaptive aquatics facility.

The facility would double the number of disabled persons the center could help.

"We're only half a facility now," Britten said. "This will complete our dream. We hope to break ground a year from today."

"This proposal is really tailor-made for this university," added CSUN Provost Louanne Kennedy. "Our vision is that it be inclusive," she said.

The proposed aquatics facility and its planned three therapeutic pools would add 7,200 square feet to the center's existing 5,000 square-foot gym. The expansion would double to more than 800 the number of clients the center can serve annually, Britten said.

The facility would comprise three pools: a 20 by 80 foot heated exercise and swimming pool, half with a moveable floor that will adapt to wheelchairs; a 25 by 25 foot "cool pool" for people with multiple sclerosis or other neurological disabilities who cannot tolerate heat, and a whirlpool for those with other orthopedic problems.

Aquatic therapy offers people with disabilities freedom of movement without pain because the buoyancy of water enables their bodies to function more freely.

Each year, the center now assists about 420 physically disabled students and community members, with from moderate to severe impairments, to become more independent through individualized adaptive and therapeutic exercise programs. Two hundred more people remain on a waiting list.

Also, the center has academic component, providing classes for about 240 CSUN students training in adaptive physical education and related programs.

The center's role begins where most conventional physical therapy programs leave off. "We go beyond the medical. Medical puts you in a wheelchair. But where do you go from there? These people are really put out on the street before they're ready," Britten said.

"People are moving back into society in ways they never thought possible. With our technology and programs, literally, miracles are happening," he added. In those days, Britten said, adaptive physical education was offered at CSUN only for injured athletes and students who were obese or who had other problems preventing them from taking other physical education courses.

But a disabled student, Lillian Bixby, changed that in the early 1960s. "She was the first (student in a) wheelchair on this campus," Britten said. "She enrolled in adaptive physical education and I had not a clue as to how to help her. She couldn't speak. She was held in a wheelchair with two straps. She had severe cerebral palsy."

Britten recalled, "She told me, 'I want to be able to get to a point in my life to have my dignity restored.' " He ended up designing an individual program for Bixby that involved intensive muscle strengthening exercises.

"In two years, we had her where she was out of her chair and balancing on a bench," Britten said. "Seven years later, she walked down the aisle with the help of a walker built just for her and was married."

Because of the experience with Bixby, Britten said he and his staff "learned the impossible could be done. And so this program began and it sprang up from there. We sent the injured athletes and obese students to another program."

As it grew, the center began to attract large numbers of disabled students to CSUN. The university now provides academic support services for about 850 disabled students.

Of the 420 people served by the center each year, about 200 are community members. One of them is Art Donnelly, a Santa Clarita community leader who was paralyzed in a September 1994 accident and later heard about CSUN's center at a hospital and from a friend.

When he enrolled at the center in April, Donnelly said, he had little mobility from his neck down. "My neck was fused. I can now move it." Through twice weekly workouts, Donnelly has regained some use of his arms and hands and is driving once again.

"It was the beginning of a new life for me," said Donnelly, who recently signed up as a volunteer in the fund-raising effort. "I became independent to a certain extent and I will become more independent."

For more information, call Dr. Britton at (818) 677-2182.