Special Olympics honor
Christelle Snow/UCLA
Special Olympics World Games executives on Nov. 30 presented UCLA Chancellor Gene Block with a commemorative torch to thank the campus for hosting athletes and events last summer.
UCLA helped stage eight sporting events and housed some 3,500 athletes and coaches in campus residence halls. Events were held at venues across Los Angeles between July 25 and Aug. 2.
With Chancellor Block holding the torch are, left to right, Jeff Carr, chief operating officer of Special Olympics World Games 2015; Mick Deluca, assistant vice chancellor of campus life; Rafer Johnson, the UCLA alumnus who helped found the Special Olympics with Eunice Kennedy Shriver in 1968, and Patrick McClenahan, 2015 Special Olympics World Games President and CEO.
The inscription on the base of the torch reads: “For your heroic contribution to the Special Olympics World Games Los Angeles 2015 and for making it possible to celebrate the courage, determination and joy of 6,500 Special Olympics athletes from around the world.”