Why is paralympics called paralympics

If it were only that easy! As an associate curator at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, people often ask me how we Faster, higher, stronger: Science and engineering behind the Olympic Winter Games. This phrase could also sum up Olympic Artifacts, Olympic Stories, part 2.

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From the Collections. Intern Perspectives. Jazz Appreciation. Julia Child Recipe of the Week. Kids in Museums. Object Project. Public Programs. These criteria and standards are sports-specific and are determined by the IPC Sports Chairpersons, the Sports Technical Delegates and the relevant international sports organizations. The Paralympics are about elite performance sport, where athletes go through a stringent qualification process so that the best, or highest qualified based on performance, can compete at the Games.

Structure Special Olympics is a global movement leading the world of sport for people with intellectual disabilities and is focused on building a worldwide network of athletes of all ability levels who compete in sports while creating communities of leaders committed to inclusion, acceptance, and dignity for all.

With a Headquarters in Washington D. Special Olympics happens year-round in seven regions of the world, over countries and has more than Programs operating daily to provide empowerment through 32 Olympics-type sports. There is an International Governing Board of Directors.

But the Games were not always as popular as they are now — here is everything you need to know about their origins.

This represents how the Games are meant to stand alongside the Olympics and be viewed on equal footing. Sport for people with disabilities started gaining more popularity after the Second World War, due to the large number of veterans and civilians who were injured. On 29 July , the day of the opening ceremony of the London Olympics, Dr Guttmann organised an archery competition for injured servicemen and women named the Stoke Mandeville Games.

Four years later Dutch veterans joined the Games, and by the event had evolved into the Paralympics. The first Games took place in Rome and featured athletes from 23 countries. The organisation offered opportunities for those athletes who could not affiliate to the International Stoke Mandeville Games: vision impaired, amputees, people with cerebral palsy and paraplegics. On 22 September , the International Paralympic Committee was founded as an international non-profit organisation in Dusseldorf, Germany, to act as the global governing body of the Paralympic movement.