The Autism Society Event and Education Recordings Archive

This session presents design recommendations for secondary and postsecondary educators and institutions interested in offering online courses that accommodate students with autism spectrum disorders (ASDs). The discussion also addresses ways to help students with ASDs adjust to online settings in a way that provides the most educational and social benefit to the students. As more universities offer courses via virtual classrooms, our institutions are also being asked to accommodate an increasingly diverse student population. The success of disability accommodations in elementary and secondary schools is expanding the number of students with special needs who are academically qualified for postsecondary admission. Among these students are individuals with ASDs—a population with unique gifts and needs.

This project sought to determine how courses in virtual spaces might be improved for university students with ASDs. The findings and developed suggestions can benefit high schools, alternative secondary schools, vocational schools, colleges and universities. More importantly, knowing what challenges exist with current course designs, students and parents can plan strategies to adjust to these issues. The original research propositions included the possibility that Web-based course management software could be optimized by examining virtual spaces favored by individuals with ASDs. Ninety-eight Web sites were analyzed and 48 adults with clinical diagnoses of ASDs were surveyed. The results directly challenged the research propositions and required a radical rethinking of the delivery of online course content. Overwhelmingly, the communities analyzed and the individuals surveyed point to a need to deliver course content via e-mail, Really Simple Syndication (RSS) and other purely textual methods. Every online community studied relays content to members via both e-mail and RSS feeds, allowing participation without accessing a Web-based interface. Seventy-five percent of the individuals surveyed indicated Web sites present challenges that cannot be addressed via traditional accessibility practices. The data suggest online courses should offer e-mail and RSS interactions as an option to the Web-based interfaces of most courseware platforms. While instructors of academic composition and technical writing courses might be tempted recreate the traditional classroom in virtual simulations, this approach not only hinders participation by students with ASDs, but also might exclude them from courses that form an important foundation for university success. Additionally, gender differences were found within the survey population relating specifically to writing and communication practices.

This study concludes with a recommendation for studies exploring these differences and any implications they might have for instruction, especially within virtual classroom settings. Recognizing there are gender differences within the ASD student community should help instructors recognize that men and women sometimes experience autism symptoms in unique ways. Too often, we forget the needs of our female students, having been conditioned to think of ASD as a "male" disorder.