|
NFL Charities Give Grant to McCarty Center Foundation
David Krichavsky,
director of National Football League’s
community affairs, has notified the J. D. McCarty
Center Foundation that it has been awarded a
grant in the amount of $5,000. The McCarty Center
Foundation was founded in 2000, to support the
programs, services and capital needs of the
J. D. McCarty Center for children with developmental
disabilities in Norman.
Uwe von Schamann, director
of development for the McCarty Center and former
NFL player with the Miami Dolphins, said the
grant would be applied to the Camp ClapHans
scholarship endowment fund.
Camp ClapHans is a summer
camp project of the J. D. McCarty Center. “There
aren’t any summer camps in Oklahoma that
are specifically designed and built for children
with developmental disabilities, said von Schamann.
“The architects, gh2 Gralla Architects
in Tulsa, have completed the initial camp concept
and are currently working on construction plans
and costs.”
The J. D. McCarty Center
is located on an 80-acre campus on the east
side of Norman. The camp will be located in
the southwest corner of the property along the
west shore of an 18-acre lake. At this time
enough money has been raised to begin phase
one of the camp construction. Groundbreaking
for phase one is anticipated to be sometime
this year.
“The scholarship endowment
fund is an important element of the Camp ClapHans
project,” von Schamann said. “The
high cost of medical care for a child with developmental
disabilities makes it financially difficult
for many parents to send their children to a
summer camp. Being able to offer scholarships
for some portion of the camp tuition, based
on the families ability to pay, makes bringing
a summer camp experience to some children closer
to being a reality.”
Camp ClapHans is named
for Sammy Jack Claphan. Claphan was a native
of Stilwell, Oklahoma. He played offensive tackle
for the University of Oklahoma and played in
the NFL for the Cleveland Browns and the San
Diego Chargers. When Claphan retired from the
NFL he returned to his hometown where he became
a special education teacher working with children
with developmental disabilities.
Claphan died unexpectedly
in 2001 at the age of 45.
The J. D. McCarty Center
is Oklahoma’s center of excellence in the
care and treatment of children with developmental
disabilities from birth to age 21. Founded in
1946, the McCarty Center only treated one diagnosis…cerebral
palsy. Today, the McCarty Center has treated
more than 70 different diagnoses in the developmental
disability category. In an average year, the
McCarty Center will see children from 70 of
Oklahoma’s 77 counties.
|
