Camas High School’s (CHS) unified basketball program will begin the 2025-2026 season with new assistant coach Trevan Carmel and head coach Erin Kennedy working alongside ongoing assistant coach Bradey Parker.
The Special Olympics is an international organization that gives students with disabilities the opportunity to participate in sports alongside their abled peers in local districts and communities. Unified sports invites players of all abilities to participate regardless of their experience in sports.
“[Unified sports is] a good learning experience for the student to try sports,” Parker said.
Parker began his coaching career as a Little League basketball coach with his father from 2011 to 2012. He assisted in coaching the CHS unified basketball team starting in 2022 and has continued since then for three ongoing years.
“[Coach Bradey] is one of the more goofier coaches that you could talk to,” Transition House student Anabelle Shearer said. “[We can] count on him for a good time.”
Carmel started his coaching years as a Little League soccer coach at BaxterSports camps in Portland in 2015. He began working with both players and students with high-support needs in 2017, which he continues to this day.
“I’ve coached a little bit of football and track and field,” Carmel said. “Coaching-wise, I would say my favorite would be basketball.”
Carmel previously worked at Liberty Middle School in the special education program. He was later transferred to CHS in 2020, where he worked alongside his coworker Kennedy, the head coach for unified basketball, as a peer educator for the following years.
Kennedy aspired to be a coach after participating in sports throughout her childhood. She was particularly drawn to unified sports because of the community it had built for students in special education.
Kennedy began working with high needs students as a peer educator in 2020 with Carmel. She then coached unified sports at CHS in 2021 as an assistant coach for unified soccer and worked her way up to becoming the head coach by the following year.
“I want to make sure that [high needs students] get as much access to the same types of stuff as their peers get,” Kennedy said. “The fact that we have unified sports is amazing, and to be a part of it just brought my heart happiness.”
Unified basketball teams are split into three models: competitive, player development, and recreation. The competitive model is composed of players of a similar age and ability who seek the intensity in sports and actively want to compete against one another. The player development model includes players of a similar age, but not ability, who want a way to stay active with reduced competition. The recreation model is for players who simply want to engage in unified basketball without the stress that is associated with competition and does not limit the teams by age or ability.
“[Unified basketball] is a passion for me to get involved with other people,” Transition House student Kaden McCormick said.
Each team during a game includes three general education players and three special education players. Helpers, experienced students who facilitate the games, give guidance to the players in order to help them understand how a situation during a game needs to be handled.
“[The helpers] basically make it so that [the players] know what hoop to shoot on or if they should be passing,” unified basketball helper and senior Andre Kosaki said.
The three unified basketball coaches help give the players an enhanced experience of being in a safe environment surrounded by their community.
“[I appreciate] how much [the coaches] care for the special ed students as well as growing connections with them,” unified basketball helper and junior Evan Gillespie said.
The first unified basketball game takes place on Jan. 17.
“I am excited about having the first game,” Shearer said. “We have games every Saturday [after the first game]. If you want to come to a game, you can.”
