Cabrini’s Cabrini Friends of Exceptional Children (CFEC) is a student-run organization that focuses on spreading awareness for children who have exceptional needs. The CFEC donated 100 books to the local elementary schools around the Radnor area on Friday, Nov. 16. The center hopes to impact children around the Philadelphia area.
What is the CFEC?
The Cabrini Friends of Exceptional Children is run by Cabrini students that focus on the message, spread the word to end the word. What this means is people with special needs used to be called “mentally retarded” and disrespected. This movement focuses on the end of the use of retarded and to respect people with special needs.
Spread the word to end the word
One of Cabrini’s CFEC program’s messages is to spread the word to end the word. The saying was created 2004 at the Special Olympics. By 2008, the first website was created to get people to see a new movement.
After a couple of Special Olympic awareness days and events, on May 26th, 2010, the U.S. Senate Committee on Health, Labor, Education and Pensions (HELP) approved Rosa’s Law to remove the words mental retardation and mentally retarded from federal laws.
So, this movement has grown to a huge movement that many schools like Cabrini continue to spread the message and educate their communities.
What other events does the CFEC cover?
What the students do is run fundraising events as a group. They also go to the Special Olympics at Villanova and the Autism Speaks Walk.
Every year Villanova University hosts a Special Olympics where schools in Pennsylvania can go out and help out the participants by volunteering their time to make sure the kids have a fun time at the Special Olympics.
“We donated over $150 towards children with autism,”Elaina Loveland, a junior at Cabrini University, said. “Our current project is collecting children’s books for a Kindergarteners’ classroom in West Philadelphia that is very low on books for children to bring home to their homes to have for their parents to read to them.”
The CFEC focuses on children with special needs and children that come from low-income families.
Philadelphia has a funding inequality problem
Some children struggle every day with not having enough resources or supplies to do well in school. So hopefully this will start a new movement in helping out schools who need assistance.
The Washington Post found that in Philadelphia, the most per-pupil spending on school operations was more in the richer areas like Lower Merion and cheaper in the poorer areas in Philadelphia.
The average cost per pupil in Lower Merion in 2015 was $22,963. Despite the high funding in Lower Merion, in Philadelphia, the price range is around $8,700 in district one of Philadelphia.
More Information
If anyone is interested in joining the CFEC you can join the club by contacting Elaina Loveland, the president, of the club @eml89@cabrini.edu
