IIa makes donation to Special Olympics

  • Published
  • By Shawn Jacobs
  • AEDC/PA
ARNOLD AIR FORCE BASE, Tenn. --  Information International Associates (IIa) Inc., a subcontractor for Aerospace Testing Alliance (ATA), made a $500 donation to Special Olympics Area 13 Aug. 11 at Arnold Engineering Development Center (AEDC).

In addition to a giant check, the star of the presentation was Shawna Eifert, a Tullahoma resident, who went all the way to the national Special Olympics in Lincoln, Neb., July 18-23 and earned a bronze medal.

"Shawna has participated for at least 10 years in Special Olympics in our Area 13, and her main sport has always been bocce," said Karen Matchett, volunteer director for Special Olympics Area 13, which includes Bedford, Coffee, Franklin, Lincoln and Moore counties. "We have a lot of other sports going on, but that's been her main sport. Right now she's living in a group home in Tullahoma with two other ladies, and she works at the Skills Development Center during the day."

Bocce is an ancient European sport, most closely resembling bowling, which involves rolling balls on a lawn.

"At our area meet she did bocce, and she went to the state," Matchett said. "She got a first or second at the state and then we had a list of people who had qualified to go [to the nationals], and then she was picked out of all the ones who qualified to go. We actually had two bocce players, one in Lincoln County and one here."

Eifert placed third at the national event, bringing home the bronze.

Eifert described her trip to Nebraska as a good experience, "Yeah, long drive, but it was fun."

She said her favorite part was "getting to stay out late every night and go shopping."
Asked about her favorite part of the games, Eifert replied, "Seeing everybody else play and being there."

In presenting the check, IIa President Bonnie Carroll noted a number of IIa and ATA employees have donated their time to Special Olympics in the past.

"It's important to us, wherever we work that we support the communities because that is just part of being a good community citizen," Carroll said. "The company likes to support our workers as well as support the communities that we live in and work in."

For example, Becky Combs, engineering technician for ATA Space and Missiles Rockets Division, is the Special Olympics Area 13 volunteer committee co-chairwoman, AEDC volunteer chairwoman and ATA volunteer co-chairwoman with Wilsie Ford, customer service representative in the IIa Photo Lab, who is also the Area 13 awards committee chairwoman. Ford and Janice Willis, who works in IIa Graphics, have volunteered with Special Olympics for at least 20 years. Combs has been involved in Area 13 Special Olympics for 10 years. Before that, she volunteered for 13 years in Kentucky.

IIa's AEDC Project Manager Kent Turner said the company employs 15 people at AEDC and about 190 companywide. It is based in Oak Ridge.

"Information management is IIa's expertise, but here we have the multimedia, which include the video, the photo and the graphics," Turner said. "We have the technical library and we're responsible for records management. We have the forms management and publications management as well, and we have the real property drawing storage and the technical publications."