'It means so much': Firestone students in Always Climbing group uplift kids with disabilities

Michelle Houser's face lit up as the boys' Firestone high school basketball team rebounded for her 8-year-old son, Ryan, who has autism spectrum disorder.

All he ever wants to do is shoot, which makes playing on an organized team difficult. Just getting the boy out of the house wearing shoes and not sandals is progress, his mom said.

Then Ryan sank a shot. The cheerleading squad at the Akron high school went nuts. The varsity basketball players leapt into the air around him. Ryan soaked up the attention, walked over to hit a volleyball over the net with other high school players and returned to the paint to shoot a few more balls.

"I've actually never seen him do this well with an organized sport," Houser said in awe of all the opportunities for people of all ages with disabilities to explore new sports Sunday at Firestone Community Learning Center.

Houser, who lives in Kent, learned about the one-day event through an autism support group that serves Greater Akron.

"My older son has autism as well," said Houser. "So far, it's been fun. They pair us with a buddy, and Ryan's been having a great time. We just did tennis. I didn't even know he liked tennis."

The day of positive programming around children with disabilities was emblematic of the ambitious organization behind it: Always Climbing , which is broadening its focus from supporting high school students through youth leadership, mentoring and local community service programs to uplifting all of Greater Akron and beyond.

Friends uplift each other and their community

Always Climbing began more than a decade ago with a group of tight-knit middle schoolers with good intentions. They pushed each other and their classmates to succeed. Somedays, they'd stay after school to clean a teacher's classroom.

The little surprise acts of kindness matured. The kids carried their signature hand gesture — thumbs together and index fingers crossed like the "X" over the mountain on their logo — into high school, where the 10 friends graduated from Firestone in 2015.

They went off to college, pursing their dreams with bachelor's, master's and even a couple doctorate degrees. From the bunch is a neuroscientist, three engineers, an Akron police officer and two best friends who founded the group: Bryce Harris, a school counselor at Helen Arnold Community Learning Center in Akron, and Jovahn Fair, an assistant director and academic counselor for Penn State University Athletics.

Harris, a starting center at the University of Toledo, had a promising professional football career before a knee injury made him rethink his future. Fair, a standout wrestler at Firestone, played football for Temple University and was picked up by the Chiefs and Browns for a season before deciding instead to pursue a career helping youth and young adults.

The best friends, like others in Always Climbing, stayed close. Many members are still local.

Last year, Harris and Fair rekindled the group's mothballed mission of community service. The high school friends, now successful professionals in their mid-20s, are busy building the next generation of student leaders in Akron.

Group accepts challenge to do more

This is the second year the group is back in action. One of Harris' mentors challenged them to do more. So, Harris tapped into Fair's knowledge of organizations to incorporate Always Climbing as an official not-for-profit charity.

Members of the organization, which can be reached at alwaysclimbingproject@gmail.com or 234-200-6490, donated their own money to give scholarships totaling $1,500 to two graduating Firestone seniors this year who "embody the Always Climbing experience," explained Harris — "students who literally go above and beyond."

There was no GPA cutoff for scholarship applicants, who can use the money for anything they want. Harris and his team, who are fundraising to do it again at the end of this school year, were looking for kids who aren't just amazing student-athletes like them. In fact, the two recipients last school year were into theatre and the arts. No, the group wants to support kids who throw themselves into every opportunity to improve themselves, their peers and their community.

"Yes, we want to do good for these kids," Fair said, surveying the cheerleaders and volleyball and basketball players working with children with disabilities in the Firestone gymnasium on Sunday. "But we want to reach out to all of Akron and Ohio at some point."

Student with 'big heart for people' leads Sunday event

Always Climbing is heavy on mentoring and exposing youth to professional pathways and diverse people so the leaders of tomorrow can help the people they meet along the way. Community service projects are a must.

And the Limitless Dreams day of service on Sunday at Firestone CLC was the one project each year that's entirely created and run by a high school student in the program.

Several students in the growing group pitched ideas this year, Harris said, but everyone was swept away by Xyia West's plan to show kids with disabilities that there are no barriers when the community shares their dreams.

Xyia , a junior at Firestone on the golf and track teams and student council, led her peers to contact vendors who offered services for people with disabilities. She coordinated the dozens and dozens of volunteers, mostly high school athletes, who gave up five hours of their Sunday afternoon to play soccer and track and field or walk kids through football drills or sacrifice themselves in a dunk tank outside. Inside, the teens cheered each ball that traveled from a disabled child through through the air, into a basket or over the volleyball net.

Xyia bounced around all afternoon, helping with the games and prizes, the closing ceremony and the row of support agencies lining the hall inside the high school entrance. Each child was given a "new friend for the day" — high school volunteers who chaperoned participants and their families.

Xyia took a few moments in each room to speak with a child looking to discover the next thing to do. She leaned in close and comforted them like she would her little brother, Othaniel, who is on the autism spectrum.

"She's always had a big heart for people," Xyia's mom, December, said. "When her brother was first diagnosed, she wanted to be at every step of the process."

Xyia wanted to connect with her brother and understand his diagnosis, so she involved herself in his therapies and appointments.

"But then she noticed we don't get to do a lot of things," December said. "He may scream or something like that."

So, Xyia became her brother's protector and advocate. One time at a restaurant, her mother recalled, a couple made fun of Othniel for being too loud. Xyia spun around and schooled them on how people with autism spectrum disorder may respond negatively to loud noises.

"They became very apologetic," December said of the couple.

'They're just like every other kid'

Xyia was overwhelmed, in a good way, by what she orchestrated Sunday.

"Seeing the families today, hearing that they've never seen such smiles on their kids' faces, it means so much to me," she said. "I always have been a big advocate for my little brother. ... I want to be an advocate for everyone else in the city of Akron, even more than that."

On the oval track outside, Jared and Jen Radenbaugh of Norton watched their son Wesley, who turns 12 in two weeks, throw a ball with one hand while gripping his walker with the other. His younger brothers — Everett, 10, Sawyer, 7, and Vaughn, 4 — took turns launching themselves off a spring board into a sand pit at the end of the long jump.

Wesley's congenital disorder left him with a small cerebellum, which has delayed his motor skills. "The brain has trouble talking to the muscles," his dad said. "Cognitively, he's all there."

Finding something local to do, even for just a day, is hard for a family with four young kids, let alone one with special needs. The Radenbaughs send the boys to Christian camps for activities. Two of the boys attend a private Christian school and two, including sixth grader Wesley, attend Norton City Schools, where "there's a lot of support for students with disabilities," their dad said.

"It seems like there's nothing too close. It's always Wooster or here," Jared Radenbaugh said of finding stuff to do that families without children with disabilities might take for granted. "Adding that to the everyday thing is tough. So, these one-day events are always good to see what's available."

And the younger boys get exposed to kids with disabilities other than their brother's. That's important for the Radenbaughs, who are trying to raise compassionate little human beings.

"Any kid with a disability, they tend to be left on the sidelines," the father said. "And so, with Wesley, we like to have him jump right in and be a part of the team. I think, for us, it's also about getting exposure to other people, too. It's not only for the one with the disability. I think people need to be aware that they're just like every other kid."

Reach reporter Doug Livingston at dlivingston@thebeaconjournal.com or 330-996-3792.

This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Always Climbing host limitless opportunities for disabled children