Today is the last day of Down Syndrome Awareness/Acceptance Month.

Yesterday, we registered Rachel for classes at Missouri State University in Springfield, Missouri.  Seventy-five days from today Rachel starts her classes at Missouri State University in Springfield. She will be in the 1st Bear POWER class.

I don’t know where you are in your journey.

I don’t know if you are expecting a baby with Down syndrome, and you are afraid.

I don’t know if you have a child with Down syndrome who has additional complex medical issues that overwhelm you.

I don’t know if you are in the early stages of battling for your child to be included with typical peers in the general education classroom.

Maybe you have a welcoming school environment.

Maybe you are exhausted from years of pushing for acceptance.

Maybe you are an educator wanting to know how you can encourage families. Maybe you are a friend of someone with Down syndrome  or a friend to their family and want to be educated or want to be able to support your friend.

I know when Rachel was born, no one was discussing college.  Our vision statement in her initial IEP at the old age of three basically said we want her to be able to get some type of vocational training so she could get a job she loved and live independently.

Wherever you are today, I want to give you hope and encouragement. According to Think College there are about 270 post-secondary programs for students with intellectual disabilities across our country.  They are very different. Every family has different needs and values so that is a good thing. More programs are launching all the time. Still, we need more programs. We need more scholarships. We need the programs to be more affordable. Some early research about some of these programs shows that over 60% of students who complete these programs have competitive employment within a year of leaving the program. This is a good starting point. To quote my husband, options are good.

This is where we are in our journey.  Rachel’s college program starts in January. The college program she has dreamed about and talked about for years, the one where she will live on campus, attend classes, participate in extra-curricular activities and make life long friends just like her friends and just like her parents, it starts in 75 days.

In this leg of her journey,  she will make mistakes. She will probably fail a test. She will have a room-mate issue. She will get in trouble with her parents because she spent too much. She will stay up too late and oversleep sometime.  Her dad and I both could say we had those same opportunities to grow.

Growing, learning, and becoming can be hard, scary, and empowering all at the same time.

Rachel’s college countdown is on! Rachel embraces the quote, “theatre is life.” I’m excited to see how all these scenes are about to unfold!