dave submitted a Washington Post article about how a wheelchair athlete has filed a federal suit against her school to be allowed to compete alongside her teammates.

Tatyana McFadden , who won two medals at the 2004 Paralympics in Athens, doesn't expect to compete against others on the field, but does want to be on the track at the same time.

The Howard County school system allows her to practice with the Atholton High School team, but has ruled she must compete in separate wheelchair events. That means she mostly competes by herself, said Lauren Young of the Maryland Disability Law Center, which filed a federal suit on McFadden's behalf.

"She's not asking to be competitively scored against able-bodied runners, but she doesn't want to be forced to run around the track all by herself," Young said.

Mark Blom , an attorney for the school system, said the school system has worked extensively with the 16-year-old McFadden, who has spina bifida, to allow her to be a part of the team and to incorporate wheelchair events into track competitions, but is against merging the two types of events.

"She essentially wants to do her event in a completely different event," Blom said.

It makes sense not to have her going around a track by herself, but this hardly seems like the way to correct that. It's not like she is going to be racing with the runners. I would think it would be distracting to both the runners and spectators while also not helping her own situation any. The mother was quoted as saying "High school sports is 'not about winning or losing, it's about learning a whole lot of other things,' Deborah McFadden said. 'Part of it is being with your friends. When you have a disability, it sometimes isolates you.'" I don't think that her competing by herself during another event would really decrease that isolation, but we'll see what the courts have to say.