St. Kate’s Special Olympics Club Grows in Unity

Some Unified Katies board members. From left to right: Hadley Ninow, Kathleen Morrison and Katherine Lew. credit: Katheine Lew

By Skylar Mattson

In the spirit of the Sisters of St. Joseph, St. Kate’s welcomes all without distinction. To love thy neighbor without distinction radiates from the core of St. Kate’s Special Olympics Club, Unified Katies.

Unified Katies President, Katherine Lew *Credit: Katherine Lew*

Current club president, Katherine Lew’25 (Exercise and Sport Science), founded Unified Katies in 2022 to share her passion for inclusion of individuals with disabilities that she developed in middle school and continued to grow in high school as a member and leader of its Unified special Olympics Club. Unified Katies is sponsored by Special Olympics Minnesota. It fosters connection between college students and individuals with intellectual disabilities through sports. The club being open to young people of all abilities from the Twin Cities area provides students a unique opportunity to build connections that extend beyond campus. The club is also unique in that it has an inclusive leadership team, with board members being individuals with and without disabilities.

Unified Katies Vice President, Hadley Ninow Credit: Katherine Lew

Since its founding, Unified Katies has seen much growth and success including awards, developing established annual events and forming major partnerships. An exciting partnership formed last year when club vice president Hadley Ninow ’26 (Psychology, Pre-Occupational Therapy) brought her idea to partner with Saint Paul Public School’s Focus Beyond program to the Unified board. As an alumni, Ninow had previous connections to Saint Paul Public Schools and its Focus Beyond Program. This connection created her vision for a partnership between Focus Beyond and Unified Katies.

She explained, “The idea behind it is we have such an incredible campus [with] beautiful facilities, and [it is] a space that we can share with the community. St. Kate’s has an initiative to reach out to the community and be a part of the community, so I thought that was a great way to fulfill that initiative.” With help from Jessica Allen, a developmental adapted physical education teacher at Saint Paul Public Schools, Ninow built a partnership between the programs. Students ages 18-22 join Unified Katies in the Butler Center weekly for adapted physical education class.

Ninow was excited to share that her senior honors project is centered around developing a class that students could take for credit that would foster conversation around adaptive physical education and interact with this partnership.

In addition to their presidential roles on Unified, both Lew and Ninow also serve on the Special Olympics Minnesota College Board of Directors as president and vice president respectively. Lew also works as a Special Olympics Minnesota Event Liaison and is on the event management team. Ninow coaches for both the Saint Paul Magic Special Olympics swim and softball team.

With schedules as full as theirs, one has to wonder where the drive for all of this advocacy work comes from. Lew explained, “My best friend since middle school has a semi-rare disability. I remember being passionate about advocating for individuals with disabilities at a young age As she and I started transitioning from middle to high school, I remember hearing about the Unified Special Olympics Club.

“From the very first club meeting we went to, I immediately fell in love with the Unified Champion Schools Model. I felt like I had truly found my niche and my community! Through my work with Special Olympics Minnesota and Special Olympics North America, as well as my degree at St. Kate’s, I have been able to learn so much about inclusion, education, leadership, social justice, advocacy, sports as a platform for change, and so much more.”

Ninow stated, “I think a large part of it is having a sibling with disabilities. My youngest sister has Down Syndrome. I had seen a couple of different organizations that work with individuals with disabilities, and she is an individual. She is not representative of all individuals with disabilities, so I really just wanted to be more immersed in that community and Special Olympics. I think sports is such a powerful way to reach individuals of all abilities because really everyone can and should be able to participate. Once I was in Special Olympics, I never looked back. It was 100% doing what I hoped to do in my career and my life.”

Lew and Ninow are both preparing to enter St. Kate’s graduate occupational therapy (OT) program this summer. They plan to continue their work on Unified Katies while they complete their first year of OT school.

One of the biggest events of the year for Unified Katies is the Polar Plunge for Special Olympics Minnesota. This semester, it will be held on Saturday, March 1st at Lake Nokomis. Lew shared, “Each year, the Special Olympics Club partners with St. Kate’s Athletics Department to host a competition between each team to see which team can raise the most money for the plunge.” Lew and Ninow encourage everyone to take the plunge at least once.

Ninow shared that Unified Katies is also excited to partner with St. Kate’s Athletics to host a basketball game where student athletes will be competing on teams with Unified athletes. The game will include concessions and Ninow hopes for fans cheering in the stands.

Unified meetings are always open to both the St. Kate’s and Special Olympics communities. You can join in on the club’s alternating sports events every other Sunday in Butler Center. If you are looking for volunteering or shadowing opportunities the club is always happy to sign off on hours! Prior experience in working with individuals with disabilities is not needed. Ninow likes to say, “You absolutely do not need any experience. All you need is a good attitude and high fives.”

Ninow hopes to see more people get involved with the club. “I think it’s so important that all people have friends of all abilities. Having friends of all abilities really shows you how to be inclusive. If you don’t interact with people with disabilities, you have this barrier. [Unified Katies] is such a great opportunity to take [that barrier down].”

You can find Unified Katies on Instagram @unifiedkaties or on their website.