BUFFALO, NY - There are moments in each of our lives that impact us forever. For Sheila O’Brien ‘88, MSED ‘05, that moment occurred 20 years ago, when she attended SABAH’s Celebration on Ice
“It was magical for me,” she recalls. “I knew then that I wanted to get involved with the organization.”
Based in Buffalo, SABAH (Skating Athletes Bold at Heart) provides therapeutic recreation to individuals challenged by physical, cognitive or emotional disabilities. Through adaptive ice skating lessons, participants work to improve their balance, coordination and strength. “It’s grueling for them,” explains O’Brien. “They’re pushing themselves to the max physically. They’re true athletes.”
But SABAH builds more than endurance.
Athletes build friendships, with each other and the hundreds of volunteers who guide them in their journeys to achieve their goals. Along the way, “Athletes learn to believe in themselves. Their courage and determination grow. They discover their potentials.”
O’Brien became a SABAH volunteer in 1995. She later joined its board of directors and in 2005, O’Brien left her job as a management recruiter to become SABAH’s executive director. She has since grown the organization in size and stature through a series of new and redefined initiatives.
What began as SABAH’s recreational ice skating program on evenings and weekends is now a year-round adaptive sports program that includes soccer, volleyball, and track and field. SABAH’s new Fit and Fun program is geared specifically toward adults challenged with disabilities. O’Brien is particularly proud of SABAH’s revamped school-day program, which she describes as a classroom on ice.
“It’s a structured educational ice skating program, which reinforces the lessons our athletes learn in school.” O’Brien notes that her Canisius education is “an invaluable resource” for her current endeavor to align SABAH’s school day program with state standards for individuals with disabilities. “My master’s degree in special education gave me the tools needed to build these SABAH programs, and to create goals and objectives based on best practices.”
O’Brien’s efforts, along with those of SABAH’s 700 athletes and 500 volunteers, culminate later this month during the Celebration on Ice at First Niagara Center. It will be O’Brien’s 20th show but it’s still just as magical as her first. Only now, she is on the ice with the athletes.
“The joy and pride on their faces as they perform are incredible,” she says. “Equally amazing is being able to look up into the crowd and see the same on the faces their family and friends. It just doesn’t get any better.”
