Nonprofit Spotlight: Limitless Ability

DR. DAROLYN “LYN” JONES WITH CONNER EDWARDS

Limitless Ability CEO Conner Edwards, his board, and his supportive team of volunteers are on a mission. When Conner was a teacher of severe and profoundly disabled students at Ben Davis High School, he realized that when his students aged out of the school system, they were forgotten.

Every year students with the highest level of complex special needs leave our public school systems and the services that they received drop off completely. Their speech, occupational, and physical therapies disappear and they enter a world where they rarely receive further skills training or social development help, and sometimes face institutionalization.

Conner kept in touch with his former students and families and knew that the only options for adults with severe disabilities weren’t good ones. They are the same options that have been around for 50 years--sheltered workshops where individuals do rote work and earn little money or centers where they sit and watch television. Some are placed in residential nursing homes that are not equipped to care for or interact with disabled young adults.

Conner visited these places and realized how much high-quality day programs for those with complex disabilities are needed. Individuals with complex needs are not being served to the same degree as individuals with fewer needs. While many day programs offer recreational programming, they usually don’t offer ongoing speech, occupational, or physical therapy.

The lack of options made Conner pause and ask what he could do. He thought back to his earlier realization: With the right supports, individuals with moderate and severe disabilities are capable of anything.

Through Limitless Ability, Conner hopes to reinvent day programming.

Limitless Ability is working on becoming an adult service provider where community involvement and the use of evidence-based therapeutic practices are woven into daily activities for people with disabilities. For example, participants going out into the community could be joined by a Speech Therapist to continue building skills using communication devices while engaging with the experience.

Right now, a small, dedicated group of volunteers is working hard to engage with families, professionals, and the community to not only educate society as a whole about the need for better services for disabled young adults but also to provide innovative experiences for them. They have so far hosted four inclusive concerts reaching over 1,000 people, as well as inclusive fitness classes, and movie nights for people of all ages and abilities.

To spread Limitless Ability’s mission of continuing services and best practices for these most vulnerable young adults as they age out of school, Limitless Ability held a professional development conference on December 10, 2024, in Indianapolis. The goal of the conference was to equip practitioners to better work with and advocate for individuals with complex needs as they transition out of school.

Limitless Ability is committed to seeing the whole person rather than the disability, and demonstrating that better services should be advocated for and demanded. Promoting intersection, interdependence, and collective access and inclusion can positively change the lives of families with a moderately to severely disabled young adult.

Rhonda Hamm, an Anderson, Indiana resident, brought her son Victor to enjoy one of Limitless Ability’s concerts. Victor attended with his brother and had a blast, and Rhonda was excited to enjoy the space with her son.

“I loved watching Victor being so happy and excited. It was such a blessing!” Hamm said.

Hamm is grateful to have an organization like Limitless Ability that integrates community and acceptance. She believes people should put their money “where the love is.”

“The more we learn each other’s stories, the better this world will be,” she added. “Learning about people with disabilities is part of that, as well as learning about any other ‘different’ kinds of people we encounter.”

As Conner reminds us, “How many adults with disabilities are infantilized? Are we withholding ‘adult’ experiences because we think that they can’t be a part of them — like a concert with 600 people and a bar?”

Young adults with disabilities are capable of living a full life, meaning they have choice and agency in their transitions, just like any other young adult. With the right supports, individuals with moderate and severe disabilities are capable of anything!

Learn more about Limitless Ability here https://limitlessabilityindiana.org. Check out information about past events here https://limitlessabilityindiana.org/ upcoming-events/

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