from their point of view dr. fleur wiorkowski fwiorkowski@sbcglobal.net 1

From Their Point of ViewDr. Fleur Wiorkowski

fwiorkowski@sbcglobal.net

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What do you think?

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• What would be the major challenges to a student with an ASD in today’s higher education system?

• How much would the degree of their ASD effect their challenges?

• How similar or different would their challenges be to those of typical college students?

Quick Definitions (and why you should care about them)

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• This was a qualitative study

• Allowed me to keep the participant’s individual voices in the study without relying on statistics to conglomerate data

•This is important because the experience of each person with an ASD is different

Overall Themes

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•Interacting with Academic Subjects•Social Experiences•Personal Growth•Learning About Learning•Issues Caused by Disability•Learning About and Understanding the Future•Feeling Proud and Positive

Theme #1: Interacting with Academic Subjects

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• Some subjects were really enjoyed and some were not enjoyed at all

• Part of the fun is having the chance to explore different subjects of study

• One of the best outcomes of this exploration is finding an area of intense interest

Theme #2: Social Experiences

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• Who believes that people with ASDs do not want to be social?

• Participants did experience negative social situations and even overt prejudice

• Learning to be social occurred more in college than high school (maybe due to diversity)

•Some degree of solitude is necessary to be social

•Ultimately culminated in wanting to give back to others

Theme #3: Personal Growth

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• Being in a new environment results in having to change the way a person behaves – and college is a very new environment

•Sometimes personal strengths are discovered in a new situation

•This combination of learning resulted in having to rethink the world view/clarify personal values and this has to result in personal growth

Theme #4–Learning about Learning

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• This theme is all about discovering personal learning styles and preferences

•People study in different ways and part of the college experience is discovering the best ways to learn and study

•Examples almost always preferred

•Learning was not universally positive – some aspects of learning were not as fun

Theme #5: Issues caused by Disability

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• Accommodations can be a real mixed blessing (hidden disability)

•Feeling academically behind because of previous learning experiences (or lack thereof)

•Finally understanding how having an ASD impacts education, both past and present

Theme #6: The Future

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• really the theme is ‘learning about and understanding the future’ but that wouldn’t fit on the heading

•Realizing that there is a future to consider and plan for

•Being excited about prospects for the future/feeling in control

•Being afraid of the future/feeling out of control

•Seeing the way the past impacts the future

Theme #7: Feeling Proud and Positive

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• This is my favorite theme to be honest – I enjoyed hearing about other people in the Autism community being successful

•Focused on feeling accepted and supported

•Enjoying aspects of learning experience

•Pride in accomplishments and achievements

Applications: What does this all mean?

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• Attending college changes lives•Not everything is positive•Not every college is a good fit for every person (don’t let one college dissuade a person from college overall)•Classes should be taken with personal goals/pace in mind•College is both social and academic•Finding area of intense interest is one of the best outcomes of college