Warrior Star Initiative – Fall 2017 Recap

The Warrior Star Initiative (WSI) is a new partnership program between Opportunity Knocks and the Dominican University Psychology and Nutrition Departments. Together, DU interns and OK Warriors perform a variety of campus and community jobs, attend DU events, and develop friendships. WSI provides the opportunity for Warriors to engage with a local college community, while also aiming to provide valuable vocational experiences and social skill development for Warriors and interns alike. Fall 2017 was the pilot semester of WSI, as we built upon a previous on-campus program run through our friends at the Trinity Volunteer Corps. Check out some of the highlights below!

“Opportunity Knocks will stand its post and will win. After this semester things will be different and will boost the confidence and self esteem levels… I’m really proud of how this semester has been so far.” – Derek Withers, Warrior

“People without disabilities are able to realize how much they have in common with people with disabilities. It continues to break down the walls of exclusion and foster a reality where we live in a world that values inclusion.” – Carolyn Effgen, Warrior parent

Vocational Experiences

DU Psychology Interns and Warriors rotated through a variety of on-campus job sites including:

Cafeteria (dish room, preparing snack packs, helping prep catering events, wiping tables),
Archive Office (scanning and saving historical documents into CPU for DU archives),
Library (cleaning, dusting, and organizing books and bookshelves),
HeadStart Nutrition (preparing “parent packs” and lesson plans for them to take into local schools for nutrition education), and the
Psychology Department (shredding old assignments).

Warrior Amanda and intern Caroline also gave disability awareness presentations to local preschool classrooms.

“The program means spreading disability awareness to the kids and it also provides me friendship.” – Amanda Ebersole, Warrior

“Psychology students benefit in so many ways from the Warrior-Star Project: They get involved in campus, they build meaningful relationships, they develop professional and clinical skills. It’s a pleasure and privilege to be a part of this initiative.” – Tina Taylor-Ritzler, psychology professor

“The Warrior Stars acquire new skills and make a meaningful contribution to our historical projects. The McGreal Center staff wins because it allows the staff to do other projects. We all win because we learn from each other and make new friends too!” – Sister Janet Welsh, OP, The McGreal Center

Campus Events

Warriors and interns have participated in several campus community events and activities to build our presence at DU, develop new relationships, and have fun:

Disability Employment Awareness Month Event with DU Disability Support Services
BINGO Day with Office of Student Involvement
Tie-Dye with DU Psychology Club
DU Day of the Dead Event
Selling Knock Out Pickles in DU bookstore for Faculty Appreciation Day
DU Women’s Basketball home opener
DU Adopt-a-Family
WSI Holiday Party

Nutrition Workshops

Our DU Nutrition intern came into the OK Life Shop for weekly nutrition workshops with 5 Warriors. Each week, she would lead a nutrition lesson alongside a Warrior, then plan for the next week with a new Warrior.

The lessons consisted of a presentation on a specific nutritional topic (planned by the Warrior leader), followed by a related cooking activity.

Some examples of lessons:

Jackie taught us about vitamins and made a salad with related foods.
Sonya made smoothies and talked to us about the health benefits of fresh fruit smoothies.
Patrick did a lesson on fermentation and made a healthy “Knock Out Pickip” (pickle dip).
Max did a lesson on hidden sugars and made healthy chocolate milkshakes.

“Warrior Star is very important to our program because we get to work with an incredible population, who is curious about information we can teach! [I have learned] the Warriors are fully capable of much more than people think and should be treated like any other person.” – Victoria Hoffman, nutrition intern