CLINTON — Randi Newland of Dennard, the mother of an active 8-year-old boy with Down syndrome, said the annual walk to raise money for and awareness of the disorder is working.
She is co-organizer of the eighth annual Clinton Down Syndrome Walk, which is scheduled for 9 a.m. to noon Sept. 7 in a new location — the Clinton High School basketball gym.
Formerly called the Buddy Walk, Newland said, the event’s name was changed last year. Newland said she and Darla McJunkins, who has a daughter with Down syndrome, decided to create their own 501(c)(3) instead of going through the Buddy Walk organization. It is easier to make decisions, and the name is to the point, she said.
“We just made it very plain and simple so everybody who heard about it knew what it was,” Newland said.
The event includes a bounce house, face-painting, music and food.
Preregistration, which ensures the receipt of an event T-shirt, is underway until Friday, and the cost is $10 for adults and $5 for children ages 10 and younger. People with Down syndrome may walk free. The event was moved from outdoors to the walking track upstairs in the air-conditioned gym, Newland said. The activities will be downstairs.
“It’s a short 1-mile walk, very easy,” she said. Newland added that about 500 people participate each year in the walk, including 10 to 15 individuals with Down syndrome.
Registration is available at www.clintondownswalk.com. Participants may register the day of the walk, too.
McJunkins said Newland started the walk with a woman who has since moved from the area; then Newland asked McJunkins to get involved.
McJunkins said her oldest daughter, Sammy, 20, who has Down syndrome, has always been included in everything the family does. McJunkins and her husband, Adam, also have two younger daughters, Lacey Belle, 16, and Katie, 14.
“We’ve always tried to mainstream [Sammy] and include her in everything we can, and the community has rallied around her,” McJunkins said.
That’s one of the goals of the walk, too, McJunkins said, for people to see that children with Down syndrome can be involved in the same activities as typically developing children.
Sammy graduated from Clinton High School, where she went through a work program called Opportunities for Work-Based Learning, or OWL. Sammy
is employed at the Clinton Elementary School cafeteria.
“She’s a funny kid; she’s a people-person,” McJunkins said. “She loves to go and be where everybody else is. She’s into sporting events and athletics and loves to attend those types of events and be in the middle of the crowd.”
However, McJunkins said, Sammy is like anyone else; she has good days and bad days.
“She has emotions just like us,” McJunkins said.
She said Sammy’s latest hobby is creating YouTube videos and tutorials on makeup application or dance moves.
“She’s into, lately, where you prank people, so we do get pranked,” McJunkins said, laughing.
Newland said her son Weston, who is in the third grade at Clinton Elementary School, is a people person, too.
“He likes everyone. He sees no wrong in anyone. He’s just fun. He’s into everything. You have to constantly watch him, but I would say he’s the life of the party; he likes to be the center of attention.”
And everyone gets a hug from him, she said.
Newland and her husband, Wes, have two other children: a daughter, Finley, 10; and an older son, Lathan, 17.
Newland said that from $10,000 to $15,000 is donated from the walk to organizations that serve people with special needs — not just Down syndrome — or their families. Some of those organizations include Special Olympics; the Ronald McDonald House in Little Rock, “because so many of our Down-syndrome kids’ parents stay there for a while”; the National Down Syndrome Society; the Arkansas Down Syndrome Association; and the Van Buren County Special School District in Clinton and its Lakeside Learning Center, of which McJunkins is a member.
The women both said the inclusion and acceptance of people with Down syndrome have improved through the years.
Newland said she wants people to know that individuals who have Down syndrome are “like everyone else; they’re more alike than different [than others]. That’s kind of the slogan everybody goes by — they need to treated like everyone else; they’re no different.”
Senior writer Tammy Keith can be reached at (501) 327-5671 or tkeith@arkansasonline.com.