Peninsula encourages all students in affiliated schools to participate in regional sporting events. In order to progress beyond this level however, athletes with a disability (AWD) need to be correctly classified.
To be selected for Peninsula, students must compete at the Peninsula cross country and track and field carnivals. Students can nominate for these events through their school, either to the district trial or direct to Peninsula.
The Queensland School Sport program offers students with a disability the opportunity to participate in an inclusive environment with their peers at a regional, state and national level.
At a national level, multi-class athletes are included in the 10–12 years track and field exchange, 10–19 years swimming championships, 10–19 years cross country and in the Pacific school games, when held. These students are selected from the state championships in these events and included into the state teams.
It is important that multi-class athletes are included into the school sport program. It is equally important that the pathways are clearly identified for participation at the school, district and regional level so that all multi-class athletes who have sporting ambition, talent and ability, are given the opportunity to proceed.
Qualifying standards are calculated for each sport and available through the regional school sport offices.
Please ensure that students with disabilities who compete within the school sport program are compared to the suggested time for their disability classification and nominated for further competition, if they qualify.
Sports offered
The sports offered for athletes with a disability at the state level are track and field, swimming and cross country. These sports are offered within the 10–12 years and the 13–19 years programs.
Classification
All students with an eligible impairment type must be classified if they wish to participate in representative school sport as a multi-class athlete.
Each sport has specific minimal disability for classification that a student must meet in order to be eligible for competition as a multi-class athlete. Athletes may be eligible for one sport but not another.
Not all students with a disability will meet the minimal classification criteria for a specific sport. If a student does not meet the criteria, they will not be eligible to compete as a multi-class athlete.
The classification system summary (PDF, 108KB) provides current classifications each with a short definition.
The Disability categories included are those specified under the International Paralympic Committee (IPC), International Sport for Athletes with an Intellectual Disability (INASFID) and International Deaf Sports (IDS) classification processes – Intellectual Impairment (ID), Hearing Impairment (HI), Physical Impairment (PI) – including Cerebral Palsy (CP), Spinal Chord Injury (SC), Amputee (A), Les Autres (LA) and Visual Impairment (VI).
All Para-Athletes must be classified according to the international standard before competing at a state and national level.
A classification step by step guide (PDF, 140KB) has been developed to enable student participation in Queensland school sport activities.