I’ve long been a fan of the Diveheart organization and a great admirer of Diveheart’s founder, Jim Elliott. The organization, founded in 2001, has changed the lives of thousands of disabled children, adults, and veterans through the sport of scuba diving. They’ve worked with individuals across the U.S. and in Mexico, Israel, Australia, China and the Caribbean.
If you’re not familiar with Diveheart, please take a moment to learn a bit about them and share it with your friends and community. This video is a recent presentation Jim Elliott gave at a TED presentation, which nicely sums up what they do, in Jim’s own words:
Diveheart is a non-profit organization (510c3) and with the exception of part-time office staff, everyone (including founder/president Jim Elliott) is a volunteer. All of the funding their raise through grants and donations goes directly to their programs and to help them accomplish their mission of taking the disabled diving.
Last year during their Festival of Human Abilities, the Aquarium of the Pacific in Long Beach hosted Diveheart as they took disabled Army Veteran Alex Calvo scuba diving (you can read about it here). Next month, Diveheart will be back in California at a fundraiser in San Francisco, which will be held at the beautiful Aquarium of the Bay.
Diveheart’s dream is to build their own training facility where they can serve children, adults and veterans with disabilities though scuba therapy, and address research, rehabilitation, education, and vocational training. They also want to expand their programs worldwide by training individuals from around the world to dive with the disabled. The potential impact on the lives of individuals with disabilities worldwide is enormous.
Please join me in supporting Diveheart on Thursday, October 16. If you’re in northern California, come to the fundraiser at the Aquarium of the Bay. If you’re not nearby, consider coming up– it’s a great time to visit San Francisco and maybe make a dive or two in nearby Monterey over the weekend. You can view a flyer by clicking the image below:
Click to enlarge
Even if you’re unable to make the trip, please consider a donation to Diveheart. The work they’re doing is nothing short of miraculous. With your support, they can continue doing the great work they do and continue to help our nation’s heroes and those less fortunate than us experience the underwater world.
Chris Constantine, California Diver Magazine