Michigan Special Olympics is an education and sports-based program that brings together students with and without disabilities.  Our Keidan Special Olympians increase their athletic abilities and leadership skills through their participation in our bowling and bocce ball teams.  Select student athletes may also compete at the state level during multi-day, overnight competitions for either winter or summer Olympic games.

Keidan students are breaking barriers with our FIRST Robotics team!  This STEM activity partners the Frog Force Robotics team with our students pairing students with and without disabilities to introduce coding and robotics to our Rising Stars.  Students build and program a robot and select students will take the robot to local competitions.  Our students grow their “gracious professionalism” building friendships, leadership, and increasing their self-esteem as the season progresses.

Keidan Students Count!

Our school encourages our students to attend EVERY day, but on Count Day?  On Count Day we celebrate!  Art and PE activities, social opportunities, prizes, and sometimes even a pizza party!

Keidan celebrates monthly themes with student-led assemblies.  These celebrations of Reading Month, Black History Month, Women’s History Month, Winter Holidays and others allow our students to learn about current events and cultural happenings and practice their public presentation skills. Our staff finds creative and engaging ways to incorporate learning and performance in ways that make each of us look forward to these monthly events that we encourage our families to attend.

Guest speakers are often invited to Keidan to share important information with our Rising Stars.  We have had local politicians, representatives from museums and local businesses come to share information with our students when bringing the field trip to us creates a more accessible activity for our students.

Keidan students have the opportunity to partake in all of the district supported, grade level field trips as their non-disabled peers.  We have taken students all over the city to engage with the rich resources that Detroit has to offer including The Detrioit Institute of Arts, The Cranbrook Museum, The Dossin Great Lakes Museum, the Detroit Zoo, and many more. 

Additionally, our building schedules life skills field trips for select classrooms to help teach independence in shopping, leisure activities and more.  Our students have gone to Meijer, to the movies, a fish farm, an apple orchard and continue to look for engaging activities to bring our classrooms out into the community.

Keidan’s courtyard garden has had some significant changes in the past few years, but we continue to think of it as a point of pride.  Our science curriculum includes the life cycle of plants, and watching vegetables grow in our raised garden beds is the perfect way to bring learning to life!  Keidan has partnered with Keep Growing Detroit to plant new and interesting vegetables for our students to taste and smell.

Select classrooms participate in this district-wide competition to promote sustainability and STEM learning. Components of the challenge vary from year to year, but often include gardening, recycling, and water conservation.  Students complete a number of hands-on activities to grow their knowledge and understanding of how their actions can make a difference in our school and our communities.