Spartan Profiles: Tyler John Damon II
SKI PATROL
Normally one thinks of skiers as perfectly healthy people, but in recent years the slopes have seen an increasing number of physically disabled skiers. They might use mono-skies, or bi-skies. A key enabling role has been played by Tyler Damon II, ’82, who in 2003 was named National Outstanding Instructor by the National Ski Patrol—an outstanding honor, considering the NSP has some 28,000 members across 500 or so ski resorts. Damon says that what set him apart has been his effort to bring awareness of how to work with disabled skiers.
“I teach others first aid, chair evacuation and tobogganing techniques,” says Tyler, who is a member of Michigan Adaptive Sports, a group that works with people with various disabilities, including spinal cord injuries and cerebral palsy. “I teach them how to render first aid and how to communicate with disabled skiers, and how to understand their equipment use.”
Tyler is currently the Chief Innovation Officer of GM R-Works in Detroit, an agency that does sponsorships, promotions and event marketing for General Motors.
A native of Lake Orion, Tyler comes from a four-generation family of advertising people. “It was logical for me to go to MSU,” he says, citing professors Bruce Vandenberg, Irv Bettinghaus and Gordon Miracle as “very influential.” While at MSU, he worked as a ski instructor for the Lansing Ski Club teaching blind skiers from the Michigan School for the Blind.
His current efforts on behalf of disabled skiers is partly motivated by his youngest of three children, 12-year-old Andrew, who suffers from the Dejerine-Sottas Syndrome, a degeneration of the nervous system. Andrew is deaf and blind and needs a wheelchair. “I come from a family of skiers so it’s important for him to learn to ski,” says Tyler, who communicates with Andrew via felt sign language. “He’s a great kid. He does a lot of things.”
