Cerebral palsy is the number one cause of childhood disability around the world. Nearly one third of children with cerebral palsy cannot stand independently and have little or no access to standing therapy. The inability to stand or sit upright comes with a number of harmful side effects including weak bones and muscles as well as poor circulation. But Kent alumnus, Scott Mitchell ‘10, is working toward a solution with his project Stand With Me.

His inspiration for the project came in the summer of 2013, when Mitchell spent three months working with medical teams in Arequipa, Peru. He unfortunately realized that none of their patients had access to standing therapy in their homes.

Mitchell described his realization during these projects, that there was a “critical need for therapeutic standing devices that were both low-cost and low-maintenance, so the equipment can be used in the home and repaired after damage or wear.” Since his influential trip, Mitchell and his team have helped to distribute over 400 standing frames across the world.

Mitchell is currently seeking interns from Kent to travel to Guatemala this summer with himself and his team. The internship will be from July 24th to August 27th. The team will work toward goals Mitchell categorized as “obtaining data, multimedia and stories suitable for informational and fundraising materials in the future” as well as “improving information transfer and between countries for future data sharing and collection.”

Students that participate in this internship will also get the opportunity to “travel door to door and visit approximately 20 children and 3 physical therapy clinics who represent the diversity of the patients that [they] support,” according to Mitchell.

Mitchell truly puts his heart into this project and believes Stand With Me has “already brought [him] to the frontlines of adversity and to the precipice of personal transformation.”