Hi, Im Evelyn Peña and I'm an associate

professor at Cal Lutheran University.

I am also the director of the Autism

in Communications Center, which is a

university center that focuses on

inclusion, communication, access, and

higher education for people with autism or

autistic individuals

This is my son, Diego Peña, he is doing a

camio today and Diego would like to

introduce himself using the letter board

since he is non speaking.

So he has his communication partner with

him and they are going to spell out

something.

(Communication Partner) H.E.L.L.O. A.L.L.

Hello all. Ok, back straight.

M.Y. N.A M.E. I.S. D.I E.G.O.

Hello all, my name is Diego.

Evelyn: Awesome, so just a little bit

about Deigo, he is going into 7th grade.

He is fully included in general education

and he is a presenter at conferences and a

best selling book author of the book,

Anatomy of Autism, so that is us and

we're excited to be here.

So, Diego is really excited to talk about

inclusion, not only in his book but also

share his thoughts.

I think that is so important in relation

to the Americans with Disability Act

because it provided an avenue for

inclusion in the community, higher

education, and employment.

As a young activist, Diego has experienced

inclusion in school so he wanted to share

some words that he typed out.

He is going to share them through his iPad

, which he calls his talker.

(iPad): I think the culture of inclusion

is important to have in order to implement

strategies be successful for autistic

students in a general education classroom.

Without inclusion, I wouldn't be able to

be in general education setting.

Having autism has limited me both verbally

and physically.

I thankfully have access to communication

by typing and this form of communicaion

has given me opportunity to be

included in general education classes and

activities in the community.

Evelyn: Thanks, Diego. So the first time I

really learned about the Amrican Disabilities Act

was when I was researching what it would

take to support my son, Diego,

He's autistic, you just met him, to go to

college essentially.

When I learned he had autism I didn't know

anything about whether or not people had

access to college if they had a diagnosis

of autism or what the precedent was for that

So, I really started looking into it and I

did learn that, yes, autistic students do

go to college. Which is wonderful.

At that time this was, you know, when

Diego was diagnosed.

It was 8 years ago or 10 years ago and

there wasn't a lot of research out there

on autistic students going to college.

So, that was one area where I'm excited

that I've been able to do research and

publish some work on how we can support

autistic studetns to go to college and

become successful. But, really the ADA

(Americans with Disabilities Act)

is so important for autistic students and

students with disabilites in general, just

to make sure that they have access to

academic curriculums, that they are

getting accommidations that they need to

be successful in academic settings.

So, I really feel that the ADA has been a

key factor in making sure that students

with disabilities are included in college

and university settings.

Certainly the ADA has provided a lot of

opportunities for students with

disabilities. So, I'm grateful for that.

I think there are some areas that we need

to think about, that the ADA does have

some limitations.

One of them is that, many disablility

service offices on campuses at higher

education institutions require diagnosis

or documentation of neuropsychological

evaluation and this can cost upwards of

several thousand dollars for individuals

to get this diagnosis.

So I think there has been a lot of

progress lately where those offices are

saying, "Ok well, we will consider the IEP

document and your individual education

plan from high school as a form to

validate that you do need services".

But one thing we do need to work on a

little more is making sure that higher

education institutions, specifically the

disabiblity offices, are a bit more

flexible in making sure that students can

receive accomodations without dropping

3 or 4 thousand dollars, in order to do that

The other thing that I think about a lot

is, while the ADA does provide important

accomodations that are reasonable and

appropriate, to students.

I think that what I have learned is

universities and disabilities offices specifically

do a much better job when they go about

and beyond their ADA

So what's required by the ADA

usually I see proper team member

the staff on campus

going above and beyond

to make sure that students feel included

that they feel like they belong in campus

and it is really important

i think i learned that we have this brief lossgreat laws

but it is also important to us to have

compassion, flexibility, to accomodate

individuals like my son Diego, who

uses, you know, must have a communication partner

with him uses iPad in order to communicate

and we find that many colleges are providing

accomodation and some are not

because it is so new to them

So i think that... al those things

are important and especially

for students of color and/or margin

or historically marginalized students

who has intersectional identity

with disability, we need to make sure

that we are providing a welcoming

and accesible environment in higher education

So i think that one of the important things

I've learned in my work so

this scholarship and the advocacy work

that I do everyday

in essence by half with faculty

and staff in higher education

setting in particular

is that we know that disability

support offices are mandated

to provide accomodation according to

the ADA but what I see a lot

is that faculty and staff

are not required to receive

training or professional development

in order to serve children with disability

And we think about this

one in ten students in college

or campus having disability

of some sort and there's

only the ones who are documented

So imagine who don't report

and having disability

But we do need our faculty

instructor, staff, to have more

knowledge, experience, tools

and their toolkit to serve students

with disability, so that we

can fully include them

make sure they're succesful and

empower them to graduate

with college degree, so that they can

move on to employment opportunity

in the future