Co-designing a STEAM-focused mentorship program with autistic college and high school students

• In Event: Co-Design as a Means of Creating Inclusive and Effective Technology-Enhanced Learning Experiences

Abstract

Objectives
The [name] project pairs autistic college mentors with autistic high school mentees to create technology-enhanced STEAM projects and explore the neurodiversity movement and educational and career trajectories together. Mentors and mentees co-design the program, deciding on content and processes and creating the materials they use, thereby taking ownership of the program. The goal is to establish a model process for co-developing mentorship programs with autistic high school and college students that support STEAM, college and career interest, self-determination, and self-efficacy through making.

Theoretical framework
Our program is rooted in two related theoretical frameworks: the neurodiversity movement (Kapp, 2020) and the double empathy problem (Milton, 2022). Our program uses a participatory approach. By prioritizing full participation of autistic students in program design and implementation, we can develop programs that are more likely to be beneficial than non-participatory programs (Botha et al., 2022a; Gillespie-Lynch et al., 2022). A growing body of research examining the double empathy problem suggests that autistic people often establish stronger rapport and communicate more effectively with one another than cross-neurotypes (e.g., Botha et al., 2022b; Chen et al., 2021; Chen et al., 2022; Crompton et al., 2020). These studies describe the important phenomenon of a shared experience among autistic people, wherein autistic mentors and mentees have empathy and social reciprocity with one another that can make within-neurotype pairings uniquely beneficial for both parties.

Methods and Data Sources
The pilot study included ten mentees from two high schools and ten mentors from two universities. The mentorship structure was flexible and adapted to the needs of participating schools as well as participants’ schedules, interests, strengths, and challenges. Based on these adaptations, two program models arose. Model 1 was primarily in-person with 1:1 mentor-mentee pairs working on technology-enhanced STEAM projects. Model 2 was primarily virtual, with all mentors working with all mentees, discussing topics such as self-advocacy, college life, and the neurodiversity movement and doing short STEAM activities. At the end of the year, we conducted focus groups and interviews with mentors and mentees about the experience and what needed to change.

Results
Our analysis of the feedback from the mentors and mentees showed that the Model 1 group enjoyed working on projects together but wanted more structure and content, and the Model 2 group liked the content but wanted more in-person interaction and project work. Both groups wanted more college/career prep information. We needed to combine elements of the two models. This summer mentors and mentees are working on that new structure together, creating materials and designing a revised program. We will survey them at the end to gather their feedback on that process.

Significance
Although many programs for autistic youth focus on self-advocacy, these may be disempowering if they position those youth as people who need help from non-autistic professionals. Instead, it is important to empower autistic youth to be leaders who share their experiences and help other autistic students become leaders themselves. [Name] was established to build knowledge about how to create such opportunities.

Authors

• Wendy B. Martin, Education Development Center, Inc.

• Ariana Riccio Arista, Education Development Center, Inc.

• Kristen Gillespie-Lynch, College of Staten Island - CUNY

• Dora Dufie Onwumere, New York University