BUDS IT Manager travels to Italy to coach at Special Olympics World Winter Games

Wed March 26 2025

Written by Tiffany Peden, Regional Communications Manager Sodexo Universities

After coaching forSpecial Olympics of the Southern Tierfor more than 20 years,Binghamton UniversityDining Services IT Manager Megan Gorski traveled to Turin, Italy, to coach the United States’ Cross Country Ski Team at the 2025Special Olympics World Winter Games.

Getting involved

Gorski, who has been withBUDSsince 2014, credits her involvement with Special Olympics to her late husband, Joe.

“My husband started coaching because of my nephew,” she said. “When my nephew Jason graduated from high school, he said, ‘Uncle Joe, we're starting a Special Olympics club,’ and Joe said, ‘Who's the coach?’ He said, ‘You are!’”

When Gorski met Joe, he was already coaching, so she first started going to events as an attendee. She remembers her first track meet in May 2003, when she saw an athlete finishing a race.

“He was coming down the track with his hands in the air, singing the ‘Rocky’ song,” she recalled. “I was hooked.”

The next year Gorski became certified as a basketball coach, and she compiled coach titles from there: tennis, softball, bocce, swimming, track, bowling, soccer and cross-country skiing.

“Joe was athletic; he was very into sports,” she said. “I am not that coach. I am the cheerleader coach. If you’re trying your best and you’re having a good time, then you’re winning.”

Gorski’s husband passed away 2 ½ years ago, leaving a big void in the Special Olympics coaching community after his 20 years of devotion, so Gorski said she and her sons made sure to carry on their involvement as coaches andUnified partners.

After getting the honor of coaching tennis for the New York State team in theUSA Gamesin 2014, Gorski decided to apply to go to Italy to coach the nation’s Special Olympics cross country ski team. She had coached the cross-country skiers at the local level for many years. Her application was approved, and in March, Gorski joined another coach from Pennsylvania to take five athletes from around the nation to compete in the World Winter Games in Turin.

Going for gold

The USA Special Olympics Cross Country Ski Team included athletes from Delaware, Seattle, Nebraska and Michigan, who all met with Gorski for a training camp last April in Utah. Her fellow coach Lester was the athletic side of the coaching crew.

“He was 71 years old, runs a couple miles every day, goes to gym,” Gorski said. “He's very athletic, so we balanced each other out, because he worried about the training schedule, and I worried about the mental health piece.”

Due to a lack of snow, the athletes had to practice on grass, and also spent time getting to know each other. After training camp, conference and video calls kept everyone in the loop until they met again at JFK Airport to fly to Italy. Opening ceremonies were held, and included a speech from Chairman of Special Olympics International Dr. Timothy Shriver.

“Athletes, you’ve made this great journey from many countries, but when you come here, you can leave just for a moment your countries behind, because here you are in Special Olympics country,” he said. “This is our own country. It is a country free of fear; it is free of contempt; it is free of exclusion. It is a country where everybody is welcome, no borders, no exclusion. This is your country, and we say to the world, welcome to the most loving and joyful country on Earth.”

The team had some practices, but also got time to explore Turin, going on Metro rides, visiting the Piazza Castello, and viewing the architecture.

“We were in downtown Turin, and they were doing a health awareness kind of event,” Gorski said. “They're all sitting on yoga mats, and they get up to dance, and Christie (one of the athletes) drops her backpack, throws her arms in the air, and starts dancing in the middle of Turin. It’s something that’s going to be in my memory for the rest of my life is just watching Christie dance in the middle of Italy without a care in the world.”

Gorski said they also took part in the tradition of trading pins with athletes from other countries, along with going to dance parties with other countries’ athletes. Gorski and her team stayed at the same Olympic Village as the athletes in the 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, and skied on the same course as those skiers.

“Between our five athletes, they won two gold medals, seven silver medals, two bronze medals, a fourth place and two sixth-place medals,” Gorski said. “The look on their face when they see they’re going home with a gold medal, or silver - there's nothing that you can imagine like a Special Olympics event because it's kindness and you're happy for the people around you. It’s genuine.”

After the competitions, Gorski was selected to be the coach to represent the United States at the Closing Ceremony. Unfortunately, an incoming inclement weather caused her and her team to need to leave early, having to miss the event.

Onward and upward

“Half of the reason why Special Olympics is so amazing is because you get to see people succeed in ways that they never expected they would succeed,” Gorski said. She said her nephew Jason (who first got her husband involved) is now 46 and still competing in Special Olympics, having been to a couple World Games. “When he was born, they told my sister-in-law he would never walk. He would never read. He would never be independent. He lives independently now, in an apartment where he's had the same job for 25 years. Special Olympics has given him some of that confidence that I don’t know that he would have had if he didn’t do sports that made him feel like he could be successful.”

Gorski enjoyed her trip to Italy and seeing her athletes and new friends have fun and succeed. They’ve already had discussions about road trips to visit each other.

In two years, the Special Olympics World Games is in Santiago, Chili, and Gorski said she’ll be applying as either a tennis or bocce coach. Two years after that, for the World Winter Games in Switzerland, her cross-country skier Rachel has already been selected as a Global Ambassador, so Gorski said she’ll be applying to coach again to be able to see Rachel there.

And locally, Gorski will continue coaching. She addedthat local clubs are always looking for volunteers.

“Anyone who wants to volunteer, volunteers are always welcome, and it opens up so many experiences,” Gorski said. “You don’t need to be athletically inclined. And, it will be one of the most rewarding things you can ever do.

“It changed the way I raised my family,” she added. “I know that I would not have raised my kids with the same kind of kindness if I didn’t have Special Olympics to teach me what kindness really was.”