Elly D. Friedmann Award
for Andrea Scherney
Andrea Scherney, track and field athlete and technical
officer of the Austrian Paralympic Committee, was awarded
the 2001 Elly D. Friedmann Outstanding Young Professional
Award at the 13th International Symposium for Adapted
Physical Activity in July in Vienna. The Elly D. Friedmann
Young Professional Awards were created in 1992 by Dr.
Claudine Sherrill, Dr. Karen DePauw and Dr. Gudrun Doll-Tepper
to encourage the development of passionate enthusiasm
and inspiration in young professionals in the area of
adapted physical activity.
Scherney has dedicated her professional life to disability
sport and adapted physical activity. After an amputation
following a motorcycle accident in 1986, she earned a
Master's degree in sport science at the Institute of Sport
Science in Vienna in 1991, becoming the first person with
a disability to do so. She is also the first female athlete
with a below-the-knee amputation to run 100m under 15
seconds and to long jump over 4 meters. Scherney competed
at the Paralympic Games Barcelona 1992, Atlanta 1997 and
Sydney 2000, winning a gold medal in Atlanta and a silver
medal in Sydney, both in javelin. She is also the world
record holder in shot and long jump. Scherney serves as
a member of the Development Committee within the European
Paralympic Committee and is an active advocate for women
in sport.
In her keynote lecture, "Competitive Sport: The
Right of People with a Disability to Accept the Challenge",
Scherney discussed some arguments against and for elite
disability sport, and examined the issues of women's participation,
integration and media coverage. "Women should not
wish to become men, in order to fit into the male-constructed
scheme of sport," said Scherney. "On the contrary,
the male structures in sport need to be changed, if the
wish to have more women in sport is not just lip service."
The full lecture is available on the IPC Website in the
"News - Current Affairs" section.
The second Outstanding Young Professional Award went
to Dr. Christoph Lienert, who is an expert in comparative
adapted physical education (APE). Beginning this fall,
Lienert will teach APE at Manhattan College in New York.
This year's Elly Friedmann Awards for Professional Contribution
went to Prof. Dr. Kurt-Alphons
Jocheim, who is one of the founders of the modern medical-professional-social
rehabilitation movement in Germany and who is President
of Rehabilitation International (RI).
Elly Friedmann was the world's leading researcher on
movement education as a means of rehabilitating and integrating
culturally deprived children. Her interest lay in approaches
to movement that stressed the integrated relationship
of mind, body and spirit.
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