The Autism Society Event and Education Recordings Archive

Objectives:

1. Attendees will be able to identify and list at least three key “soft skills” necessary to get and keep employment.

2. Attendees will be able to describe at least two necessary supports for maintaining employment for individuals with autism.

3. Attendees will be able to generalize about neurodiversity and employment opportunities beyond the high tech industry to their own situation.

Content Plan:

Autism does not end when a child reaches adulthood. According to the National Autistic Society the combined under and unemployment for adults with autism,even for those with college degrees, may be as high as 88%. Stress for families goes up once formal education is over and services are scarce especially for those without cognitive disability. As a result, many parents live in a state of chronic desperation making comments such as “I cannot even die” or “Our nest will never be empty.”

On April 2, 2015, this urgent matter led United Nations General Secretary Ban Ki-moon to launch an employment “Call to Action” and invited large and small businesses and public employers around the world to make concrete commitments to employ people on the autism spectrum.

As Steve Silberman described in Neurotribes: The Legacy of Autism and the Future of Neurodiversity, “neurodiversity: the notion that conditions like autism, dyslexia, and attention-deficit/ hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) should be regarded as naturally occurring cognitive variations with distinctive strengths that have contributed to the evolution of technology and culture rather than mere checklists of deficits and dysfunctions.” (p.16)

This panel brings together the real life experiences of Drs. Stephen Shore and Robert Naseef, lead trainers for a pre-employment training project—“Soft Skills for the Workplace.” Tanya Regli is the Executive Director of The Arc of Philadelphia. This intensive 5 day program was the fruit of collaboration between a non-profit (Arc), private industry (SAP), the Bureau of Vocational Rehabilitation, Specialisterne, and Montgomery County Community College. More recently, the Pennsylvania Department of Education (PDE) has funded the dissemination of the training modules to school districts statewide. These modules will soon be available on the Internet and will be introduced on this presentation.

Research suggests that individuals with autism have such as, heightened abilities in pattern recognition and logical reasoning, as well as a greater attention to detail. The barriers needing to be overcome include: a shortage of soft skills training, inadequate support with job placement, discrimination, and increasing awareness and training for employers.

Corporations like SAP, Ernst and Young, Microsoft, HP, etc. are setting an example for large and small businesses and government to look closer at how they perceive people with autism and other disabilities and to create life-changing opportunities that will benefit their organizations and society as a whole.