How Much Do You Know About Easter Seals?
By Teresa Ambord
You’ve probably heard of Easter Seals, but how much do you know about them? Do you know what population they help and what services are available through Easter Seals?
More than 80 years ago, an Ohio-businessman lost his son after a streetcar accident. If adequate medical services had been available, Edgar Allen’s son might have lived. With that realization, Allen sold his business and began a campaign to build a hospital in Elyria, Ohio, to help ensure that others would not be lost because of lack of available care.
As he investigated, Allen discovered that many disabled children were kept hidden from view. To change that tendency, he founded the National Society for Crippled Children (NSCC) in 1919. That was the original name of the organization we now know as Easter Seals.
Fifteen years later, in 1934, the NSCC launched the first ever Easter Seal campaign as a way to raise funds. The lily was chosen as theme of the campaign because it symbolizes spring. It later became the official logo of the NSCC because of its association with resurrection and new life.
Donors to NSCC would use Easter Seals whenever they sent out bills or letters, as a way to show support and publicize the cause of NSCC. The strong affiliation of the Easter Seals with the National Society for Crippled Children prompted the charity to adopt Easter Seals as its new name in 1967.
Today, Easter Seals maintains 450 service sites, and each year, helps a million children and adults who are disabled.
What kinds of help are available through Easter Seals?
Here are a few examples:
- Early intervention: disabled children learn to achieve simple goals that most children and their parents can take for granted, like rolling over, eating, and holding their own baby bottles. Most early intervention services are done in the homes of the children, though for parents who must be at work, services are also available at childcare facilities.
- Job training and employment: disabled individuals develop skills that will help them enter the workforce or return to work after an accident. Participants and their employers will tell you, the benefit is mutual.
- Adult day care: this service is for young adults who need some support during the day, and older adults who aren’t yet ready to live in a nursing home, but also need daytime support while their caregivers work.
- Other services include: physical therapy, medical rehabilitation, occupational therapy, speech and hearing therapy, and childcare.
It probably will come as no surprise that Easter Seals was instrumental in helping to pass the Americans with Disabilities Act in 1990, that prohibits discrimination against those with mental and physical disabilities, and protects their civil rights.
In case you are wondering, Easter Seals are not limited to those with certain disabilities, nor does Easter Seals serve only those of specific religions. Their services are available to all disabilities and those of all faiths, or no faith.
For More Information:
Easter Seals receive funding from the government, from private donations, and from public contributions. If you’d like to donate, visit this Web site:
If you’re civic minded and want to see what current legislation may affect Easter Seals, go to this site:
Finally, for a preview of what the next Easter Seals to be produced will look like, go to this Web site and see the finalists from the summer Easter Seals. You’ll meet the artists who created the winning seals and see their designs:
