LAS VEGAS (FOX5) — A Touro University of Nevada graduate student’s class project is now expanding to 62 locations across the country and into Mexico—creating a first-of-its-kind curriculum for teens and adults with Down syndrome.
Sara Gudiel, who graduates Monday, June 15, developed a six-week program designed to help individuals with Down syndrome build independence as they transition into adulthood. The curriculum launched at Gigi’s Playhouse Las Vegas and is now being introduced at Gigi’s Playhouse locations nationwide.
MORE ON FOX5: Las Vegas valley grad student’s project becomes national curriculum for Down syndrome community
Finding Independence
For 29-year-old Otischa Smiley, the program has been life-changing.
“We’re cooking. We have good conversations. We’re dancing. We’re active. It’s so fantabulous,” Smiley said.
Smiley, who loves to entertain and cook, spends her weekends dancing at church and her weekdays at Gigi’s Playhouse.
“It’s so fun. I like this place. I feel like a new me — a new diva,” she said.
Smiley said her sense of independence began at home.
“I love my parents. They raised me to be independent, strong, powerful, and I love that,” she said.
Addressing a Critical Gap
But for many families, that transition into adulthood can be challenging.
“A lot of these families need extra support, especially when understanding guardianship and medical rights after they turn 18 and they’re aging out of the school system,” said Justine Chevalier, site manager at Gigi’s Playhouse Las Vegas.
The organization offers free occupational therapy and educational programs, but Chevalier said families often encounter a gap in services once participants reach adulthood.
The Empower Program
That’s where Gudiel’s Empower program comes in.
Now in her third year of occupational therapy school, Gudiel created the program to focus on key life skills such as self-care, nutrition, leisure, and self-advocacy.
“I like spinach, avocado, guacamole,” Smiley said. “Because we learned about the good food, bad food.”
Gudiel said the impact goes beyond the classroom. One parent told her the program helped her daughter communicate in a way she hadn’t before.
“I had a parent come up to me and say, ‘My daughter usually never comes to me if something is hurting her…’ and that day, she hurt her hand and actually went up to her mom and told her,” Gudiel said.
For Chevalier—who is also a mother of a daughter with Down syndrome—the program provides something invaluable: guidance.
“As a mom, as a parent, I’m raising two independent women. And it’s going to look very different for my oldest daughter as it is for my youngest… But to be able to have a guideline on how to support her where she needs to be supported,” she said.
Looking Ahead
For Smiley, that support has already made a difference.
“Yes. I love that,” she said.
Gudiel hopes the program helps people see participants for who they truly are.
“These individuals are more than just their diagnosis or what people view them as. They are so much more than that,” she said.
Gudiel already has a job lined up in occupational therapy—and says her time at Gigi’s Playhouse not only shaped this program, but her future as well.
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