Helping to Overcome Physical Expectations, or HOPE for short, is a growing network of collegiate Service Chapters dedicated to working with children with disabilities in local special needs schools. Through weekly one-on-one mentorship, HOPE volunteers, affectionately called Hopesters, help children with special needs exceed goals and objectives identified on their children’s Individualized Education Plans (IEPs).

Committed to helping children with disabilities, HOPE’s mission is to build social capital that allows us to break down the barriers which isolate “us” from “them.” Hopesters understand that compassion and empathy aid our society in fostering an inclusive environment. Therefore, in working with children with disabilities—whom others may shy away from—Hopesters increase their understanding of a unique “them” population. After all, persons with disabilities are the patients that our future doctors will see, clients that aspiring attorneys will serve, and potential neighbors who we will live beside. In short, HOPE inspires volunteerism that enables our members to more effectively understand the unique talents, skills, and complications of persons with disabilities.

Since our founding—and subsequent success—at Wake Forest University, we are currently expanding our organization and looking to establish HOPE Service Chapters at other colleges for the mutual benefit of both children with disabilities and college students. In doing so, these HOPE Service Chapters will promote our organization’s mission: to provide direct mentorship of children with disabilities and to foster indirect knowledge and respect for persons with disabilities from the college student population.

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