From a bean bag toss to basketball to a game of kick ball, nearly three dozen students took part in the Trojan Games Thursday at Northeast High School, each leaving with their own participation medal and a smile on their face.

All 32 students who took part in the games attend Lauderdale County School District self-contained classes at Northeast High School, Northeast Middle School or self-contained third and fourth grade classes at Northeast Elementary School.

Largely organized by Northeast High’s NJROTC instructors and cadets with the help of numerous student volunteers and school administrators, the event was deemed a success by organizers.

“They’re enjoying it. There’s a lot of smiles. They’re loving to run around and throw stuff,” said NJROTC Cadet Mary Margaret Stevens. “I think it has had a great turnout so far.”

Stevens, the cadet commanding officer, served as one of the cadets in charge of the event, along with NJROTC Cadet Zachary Boyd, the cadet executive officer.

The idea for the Trojan Games, similar in style to a Special Olympics event, came about last fall.

Northeast High’s senior NJROTC instructor, retired Cmdr. Chad West, was brainstorming ideas with fellow NJROTC instructor Senior Chief Kent Malone. They liked the idea of their cadets participating in the Special Olympics, but when they reached out to the organization, they discovered Lauderdale County’s Special Olympics coordinator position was vacant.

“We were a little disappointed because we think there’s some character building that goes into helping and working with others,” West said. “So, Senior Chief and I started talking, and we were like, ‘Hey, how about we do something like that here?’ So that was the genesis of it. We wanted to fill a gap that our special needs students don’t have filled.”

The NJROTC received a great deal of support for the event from Victor Gilstrap, the district’s assistant superintendent of student services and school improvement, as well as Leadership Lauderdale, the Lauderdale County Foundation for Excellence in Education, and several businesses in the community.

“We thought our special needs students, they just really don’t get to do much, so we wanted to do something for them,” Stevens said.

She said some of the NJROTC cadets have helped with Top Soccer in the community, but when planning the Trojan Games, they wanted to include more games and invite more students.

“We wanted to make it bigger, and we wanted to have our elementary kids included and our middle school kids included,” she said. “This is what today is for, just a chance for them to get out and be active and have a good time and be included with everything.”

Paired with a student volunteer buddy and led by a group coach, the students spent the morning rotating through eight game stations, which included a relay race, soccer, a bean bag toss, a football toss, Wiffle ball longest drive and tennis ball toss on the football field. Basketball and volleyball were held in the school gym. Then, they enjoyed lunch, face painting and a little fun in inflatable bounce houses, before an early afternoon game of kickball on the sotball field followed by the medal presentation. Participating students also received a Trojan Games T-shirt.

“Today is just for our Northeast family of schools,” West said. “Our goal is to do a countywide event in May for all of the Lauderdale County Schools.”