Florida Tech Teams Welcome All-Ability Athletes as Honorary Panthers
Florida Tech's All-Abilities Buddy Program pairs young adults with Panther teams for signing days, practices, games and long-term friendships.
Signing Day usually belongs to highly recruited college athletes. At Florida Tech, it now belongs to a new group of Panthers, too.
The university's All-Abilities Buddy Program pairs each Panther athletic team with a young adult with a disability. Buddies are welcomed through a college-style signing ceremony, then become honorary team members who can attend games, practices and other team events.
The result is not a one-day photo opportunity. It is a place on the team and a relationship intended to last.
An idea that started with one community event
The program began in 2025 through a partnership between Florida Tech Athletics and All Ability Sports, a Brevard Fellowship of Christian Athletes organization.
Former Panthers men's lacrosse player Brian Barlotta '25 helped start the initiative after connecting with the organization through a Space Coast Field of Dreams family fun day. The athletes and families clicked, and Barlotta saw an opportunity to build something more consistent.
Florida Tech athletic director Jamie Joss supported the idea. The university then created Signing Day events modeled on the ceremonies that welcome recruited college athletes.
Each buddy is between 18 and 22 years old and is paired with a Florida Tech team. The signing marks the beginning; the meaningful part comes afterward, when buddies join the ordinary rhythm of a season.
More than a guest on the sideline
Florida Tech says buddies have attended practices, games and team activities through the program's first semesters. Coaches describe the experience as a way for their scholar-athletes to put values such as family, service and leadership into practice.
Women's soccer coach Katy Freels said the program gives her athletes perspective beyond the scoreboard. Men's cross country and track coach Pete Mazzone said coaches can help students recognize opportunities to serve even when academics and training already fill their schedules.
Joss believes the benefit flows in both directions. The honorary Panthers gain the camaraderie and recognition that come with a college team, while Florida Tech athletes learn how much influence they can have by making room for someone else.
That is the strength of the buddy model: inclusion is built into existing team life instead of separated into a special event somewhere else.
A program meant to grow
Florida Tech has completed the initiative's first couple of semesters, and Joss is already thinking in years. He said he hopes the program can one day have an alumni group of more than 100 buddies who have moved through Panther Athletics.
For families, that long view matters. A ceremonial jersey is exciting; a team that remembers a buddy's name, expects to see them at practice and celebrates them through a season creates something deeper.
The partnership also gives Brevard athletes and fans a simple example of inclusion that other schools, teams and organizations can adapt: begin with an invitation, make the welcome official and keep showing up after the ceremony is over.
Families who want to learn more about inclusive sports opportunities can visit Brevard FCA's All Abilities program. Panther fans can follow Florida Tech Athletics for schedules and team news.
Sources and useful links
Claire Szewczyk
Claire has called Florida home for a decade, but her love of the Space Coast goes back further — to the beat-up Kennedy Space Center coffee table book she found in a thrift store when she was five. She writes about the people, places, and history that make Brevard County great, and those stories are where Brightside Brevard began.
