ACCESS AWARD RECIPIENT SPECIAL OLYMPICS CHIEF HONORED.Byline: Daily News LANCASTER -- Antelope Valley This article is about the Los Angeles County region. For the census-designated place in Wyoming, see Antelope Valley-Crestview, Wyoming. The Antelope Valley Special Olympics Special Olympics International sports program for people with intellectual disability. It provides year-round training and athletic competition in a variety of Olympic-type summer and winter sports for participants. director Dennis Wick has been honored by the Los Angeles County Commission on Disabilities. Wick was one of five Los Angeles County residents honored with Access Awards, which recognize people who have shown exceptional dedication, leadership and advocacy on behalf of people with disabilities. The recipients were recognized at a lunch Wednesday in the Music Center's Dorothy Chandler Pavilion The Dorothy Chandler Pavilion is one of the halls in the Los Angeles Music Center (which is one of the three largest performing arts centers in the United States). The Music Center's other halls include the Mark Taper Forum, Ahmanson Theatre, and Walt Disney Concert Hall. in downtown Los Angeles Downtown Los Angeles is the central business district of Los Angeles, California, located close to the geographic center of the metropolitan area. The sprawling, multi-centered megacity is such that its downtown core is often considered just another district like Hollywood or . Wick, 62, has taught special-education programs to mentally disabled mentally disabled See Cognitively impaired. youths and adults for 33 years in the Antelope Valley. From 1969 to 1974, he taught for Keppel Union School District, and from 1974 to 2000 for the Los Angeles County Office of Education. Since 2000, he has taught for the Antelope Valley Union High School District The Antelope Valley Union High School District (A.V.U.H.S.D.) is located in the Antelope Valley area of California, in northern Los Angeles County. The district includes eight public high schools, one trade school, and two continuation high schools in the cities of Palmdale . Since 1977, he has been the volunteer director of the Antelope Valley Special Olympics, which offers year-round sports training and competition for mentally disabled people. With Wick as its director, the Antelope Valley program has grown from 50 participants to about 650 who take part weekly in 12 sports. Wick was named the California Special Olympics Volunteer of the Year in 1992, and in 1998 received the the Bishop Charles Francis Buddy Award for University of San Diego alumni who contribute significantly to humanitarian causes. He was Los Angeles County Office of Education special-education teacher of the year in 1999, when his class was recognized as an exemplary program for its teaching of independent living skills for students at the high school and college levels. CAPTION(S): photo Photo: Dennis Wick was honored by the Los Angeles County Commission on Disabilities. |
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