A Heartland Community College HALO student is now also a Special Olympics World Winter Games medalist.
Daniel Johnson captured a silver medal in 400-meter snowshoeing at the games held in Turin, Italy with a time of 1:40.56.
As a member of the USA Special Olympics Team, he competed in the 400-meter, 800-meter (4th finish), and 4×100-meter (5th finish) snowshoeing events at the 2025 World Winter Games.
The Special Olympics World Winter Games were held March 8-16 with 1,500 athletes from 103 countries competing.
Daniel, a resident of Normal, has been involved in Special Olympics for 14 years, participating in various sports such as athletics, basketball, powerlifting, softball, and volleyball. After winning gold at the 2023 Illinois Special Olympics Winter Games he was nominated for a spot at the World Games.
He competes in snowshoeing and other programs through the SOAR (Special Opportunities Available in Recreation) program jointly sponsored by the City of Bloomington and the Town of Normal Parks & Recreation Departments.
A graduate of Normal Community High School, Daniel is in his Transition Year of the Heartland HALO program. HALO provides a higher education experience for students ages 18-28 with intellectual and/or developmental disabilities as well as other learning challenges. This program allows students to experience college while developing indispensable life skills such as independence, time management, responsibility, self-advocacy, and more.
For more information about HALO and the program’s application process, please visit http://www.heartland.edu/halo.
