While older veterans with disabilities have been a familiar sight on the campus of Slippery Rock University, they will be joined this fall by younger men and women.

Slippery Rock has received a $25,000 grant for a student-led effort to introduce activities like wheelchair basketball and rugby to veterans of the Iraq and Afghan wars.

The funds come from the Christopher and Dana Reeve Foundation.

"We're going to attract a new group of younger veterans and promote a higher level of fitness, recreation and competitive sport opportunities for them," said Robert Arnhold, a professor of exercise and rehabilitative sciences. The programs are offered through the university's Department of Exercise and Rehabilitative Sciences.

The latest grant brings to more than $108,000 the Reeve Foundation has provided over the past five years to support Slippery Rock students and programs.

Its first two grants financed scholarships for students with spinal cord injuries, allowing them to enroll in a university program that prepares instructors to teach adapted physical activity.

"We are training our fifth student, who will finish in about two years," Dr. Arnhold said. "We have others who are working in the field, and they are doing great."

Another grant supported a mentoring program for women and girls with disabilities. It was created in conjunction with a national women's wheelchair basketball tournament held at Slippery Rock in 2005.

The fourth grant supported collaboration with Temple University to compare adapted recreation needs and opportunities in rural and urban areas, Dr. Arnhold said. The program has included exchanges, visits and seminars involving faculty and students from the two universities.

The most recent $25,000 grant will support an expansion of a recreation and physical activity that now works with older patients being treated through the Butler VA Medical Center. The 15 veterans served each week range in age from about 50 to 80.

The new program will concentrate on those who were wounded during more recent conflicts, Dr. Arnhold said. Their conditions include amputations, back injuries, vision loss and post-traumatic stress disorders.

While concentrating on participants from Lawrence, Butler and Mercer counties, the new program is likely to draw interest among residents farther north in Venango and Erie counties as well, he predicted.

Natalie White, a senior exercise major from Mechanicsburg, has been hired as program coordinator.

The activities offered will depend on the interests of the participants, determined largely through surveys and questionnaires. In addition to team sports like wheelchair basketball and rugby, options will include rock climbing and horseback riding at the university's Storm Harbor Equestrian Center.

"We're not going to be the ones choosing activities," Dr. Arnold said. "We want the participants to tell us what they want to do."

Veterans interested in more information about the program can call 724-738-2847.

Slippery Rock has 125 students enrolled in its minor concentration in adapted physical activity. In the 24-credit program, future teachers and gym instructors learn how to modify physical education and exercise programs for people with disabilities.

Slippery Rock plans to begin a master's degree program in adapted physical activity this fall.

The Reeve Foundation is named for actor Christopher Reeve, who was paralyzed in a riding accident, and his wife, Dana. The couple supported research into spinal cord injuries and programs to aid people living with those disabilities.