We provide recreational activities, services and advocacy for the disabled population in Santa Cruz County.
Our opportunities for social and recreational interaction for individuals with physical and/or cognitive disabilities encourage participants to experience physical challenges that lead to personal growth, enhanced self-esteem, social development, physical skills, and an overall improved quality of life.
Shared Adventures provides 100+ activities for over 1,000 individuals with disabilities each year. Some of our most successful activities are those that include family: parents, children, siblings and partners. Our initiative this year is to make more activities family oriented and encourage families to participate. This will enrich the activities for all participants and bring about family bonding through shared experiences. We hope to include 300 family members along with the disabled persons.
Our work helps disabled individuals and their families achieve stable, healthy conditions and integrate in jobs and schools, leading to less institutionalization, crime and drug use, and family fragmentation.
I still get tears of joy remembering the first time SA took me out in a kayak, seeing the cutest sea otters up close. When people said, "There's a sea otter," I had never been able to see them. Thank you for eye-opening and heart-opening possibilities I did not dream possible, the hard work and incredible organizing.
Willow, Santa Cruz, 48
