The DCARC/Riggs Bank Scholarship Contest
District of Columbia Association of Retarded Citizens and Riggs Bank sponsor this annual essay contest as part of their scholarship program for D.C. high school students. Students wrote on the theme "Mentally Retarded Persons In My Neighborhood: Let's Make It Work." More than 300 students from public and private school competed for the prizes ranging from $50 savings bonds for individual school winners to $2000 scholarships for city-wide winners. The essays were judged on accuracy of information, originality, and grammar.</br></br>All Saints: Alita Robinson; Banneker: Sara Cormeny; Carroll: Brian Knestout; Coolidge: Sheree Johnson; Dunbar: Carmela Smith; Ellington: Miraculous Dyer; Mackin: Brian West; Spingarn: Brenda Contee; Roosevelt: Shaun Patterson.</br></br>The following are excerpts from the first, second and third place essays by the winning students: FIRST PLACE</br></br>Just a few years ago, a random group of 50 people in the United States were asked questions such as, "What do you think are the needs of the handicapped?" and "What would you do if you were one?" The interviewers met with surprising reluctance on the part of people even to discuss such matters. Typical was the response of a hair dresser who said "These are not things for our concern; let the social workers worry about it." This attitude of refusing to think about a problem at all is called by researchers a "psychic shut down." Unfortunately, "pyschic shut down" has helped to shut mentally retarded persons inside institutions and denied them access to life in public communities.</br></br>Mental retardation is often thought of as a badge of shame, a malady drafted with the language of contempt. It is often little more understood by friends and family than it was in medieval times when mentally retarded persons were thought of as being posessed by the devil. Since then, the veil of mystery surrounding mental retardation has begun to be lowered. Presently, it is recognized as a condition that interferes with intellectual development before or during birth and even in the early years of childhood. Many consider mentally retarded persons untrainable; however, 90 percent of the six million Americans diagnosed as mentally retarded are capable of learning to hold responsibilities, productive jobs if provided with the proper education and training.