Peer (ASD to ASD) Mentoring Possibilities

by Dora Raymaker · 2009-04-27 16:00:00 UTC
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a young woman stands on a grassy hill in front of a bill board. the billboard has a black and white picture of a man with a t-shirt that has a blue 'm' on it in the style of superman's 's.' text on the billboard reads 'be someone's hero...be a mentor 770-535-1050 www.centerpointgainsville.com'A project "With a Little Help from My Friends" in Walla Walla (WA) trains people to become mentors to kids with disabilities, grades 6 through college. The project specializes in 5 specific disabilities, of which autism is one. Whether the mentors are themselves disabled is unclear from the article (though my unfortunate guess is that the answer is an assumed "no"). What about hooking a 6th grader on the spectrum up with a 12th grader who is also on the spectrum?

A new program and study where it is clear however, is the STEM Mentor Project which matches a disabled college student in a science, technology, engineering, or math (STEM) major with a high school student who has a similar disability and area of interest. The stated purpose of that study,

The purpose of the STEM Mentor project is to find out whether mentors who are in STEM postsecondary programs or careers will increase youth interest in and plans to go to college and work in a STEM field.

Although one does not, to my knowledge, exist currently, the idea of an all-autistic "big brothers / big sisters" type program has come up a lot both within the autistic young adult and adult community, and from other sources--for example support staff I spoke with last week who have interest in connecting autistic clients up with mentors who are also on the spectrum.

An idea whose time has come?

Dora Raymaker
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