Patty Spagnuolo talks with Dr. Toni Glasscoe and Michelle Strauss, as they discuss the critical importance of fostering a neurodivergent-friendly campus at Lansing Community College. The guests share insights on the evolution of community support for neurodiverse individuals and highlight innovative programs designed to enhance college access and success. This episode serves as a vital resource for understanding and promoting awareness of neurodiversity within educational settings.

Welcome to the StarZone, I'm Patty Spagnuolo. From resource fairs geared towards our students, to arts and entertainment aimed to connect with our community, Lansing Community College hosts many events throughout the year, and the StarZone gives you a rundown on what's on the way, where it's happening, and how you can get into the zone at LCC.

Hello everyone. Thank you for stopping by the Star Zone today. We are talking about a neurodivergent, friendly campus and my two guests happen to.

Be experts in the subject.

Dr. Toni Glasscoe,

Associate Vice President of External affairs at Lansing Community College, and Michele Strasz, the Director of the Capital Area College Access Network. Thank you both for being here. Welcome.

Thank you.

So I've known both of these ladies for many, many years and I'm excited to pick their brains about this particular topic. It's also very near and dear to me. So let's begin with a little background regarding the autism spectrum.

What are some examples of diverse cognitive, sensory and communication skills?

Well, I think the typical diagnoses that students might get either through their doctor or through the school district when they are in K12 is something like ADHD, add to dyslexia and then being on the autism spectrum.

But there are certainly a lot of other conditions, I guess, that might merit a diagnosis of neurodiversity or certainly a need for accommodations for a student when they are in K to 12, and then of course, as we begin to transfer into post secondary education. But typically those are the primary diagnoses that would come through a medical sort of diagnosis.

Patty, the reason we like to use neurodiversity is because that's more of a social justice label and we are not experts. I want to put that disclaimer out there, but we have learned a lot.

And I appreciate Michelle's definition because it's very clinical and very formal and educators and others will understand exactly what she just shared. I deal with so many individuals that are not practitioners, parents and students.

And I like to talk about the social justice aspect and the fact that all of our students need a place where they belong, a place where they're supported. And when you create those spaces, all students are lifted and all students learn.

What I've learned over time is that I can identify students, but I'm careful not to label them if they're hyper focused.

And Patty, you've probably seen this where it's real difficult to get the individual off whatever they're focusing on because they are concentrating so hard that they may not even know or see what's going on around them. I have a young man that I've befriended at church. He repeats the same sentence over and over and over again.

He is brilliant and whatever he's sharing with me because his area of expertise, what he studied, and he's been really hyper focused on finances, investments, and he will tell me five or six times what to invest in the trading that he's doing. His brain is wired in a different way, but it's not broken. His diagnosis is autism. High functioning, high iq, but the diagnosis is autism.

Great.

Well, thanks both of you for that because I think both definitions really help us understand, especially for people who aren't dealing with it on a regular basis. And then how many times are we coming across it and not realizing it? You know, I think we see that a lot now and now we're more in tune to it.

So I appreciate that. So how many people do we think are estimated that will come from K12 into the higher ed system that have an EDP or an educational development plan?

Yeah, well, typically we see about 10% of students with disabilities coming out of K12, but within that, then there's the context of the students that might be neurodiverse. There actually was a journal article that just came out last week from Michigan State.

Dr. Brad Cox at Michigan State, who did some assessment, kind of a census across the country.

And what they discovered was that the number of students who are diagnosed with neurodiversity or self report that they are neurodiverse is actually five times greater than what they previously thought. And that's for a lot of reasons.

So, you know, we've got over 200,000 young people in our college and university system across the country that are probably neurodiverse. We are doing a much better job of diagnosing them to begin with now from early childhood on.

Secondly, more and more colleges and universities are offering support services and opportunities that actually make it possible for these young people to attend college. So that means we are going to see a greater increase in the numbers of students.

But there are also plenty of students that don't self disclose to their disability offices at their colleges and universities. So my guess is the number's even bigger maybe than what this recent journal article is projecting as the growth in this population.

Right. And I think probably early on it was a stigma.

Me, Patty, was the feeling that there was little hope and few options. I remember crying all the way through that conversation and my heart went out to parents.

As we gathered information, working with Landmark College, one of the foremost experts in the nation as it relates to students with differing abilities. Now, the government, special ed in general, society calls it disabilities, but I have a real difficult time with that term.

There are times I have to use it, otherwise people in the room don't know what I'm talking about. And when we gathered information, there were tears.

We haven't covered all of the areas where parents need support, their students need support. We've had some false starts.

We've discovered some things and we know that we cannot serve every student that has been diagnosed or they haven't been diagnosed. But we can do a better job of supporting all students.

But now as this type of programming has evolved and certainly our work here at LCC has grown, families A have hope and B start to see that there might be good match and fit opportunities for their students.

And traditionally, families would have to send their kids away to school in order to be able to take advantage of a lot of this very specialized advising, support, counseling, etc.

But the fact that we can now talk about some options here gives families an opportunity to say, oh, okay, well, I can transition from a K 12 high school to Lansing Community College.

My student can still live at home and have the support that they need from family in order to be successful and then also have support in the classroom to be successful students and to continue their journey and figure out what their right match and fit is ultimately for them is a potential career opportunity.

You know what Sort of jumped out at me during that conversation process was that there was a high school student that was talking about having to advocate for himself. Like the teacher. Every test he had to go up to her desk and say, no, I have special whatever. I need more time.

He had to do that every day, every single time to the same teacher and not knocking anybody. People don't know what they don't know.

But I just thought how, you know, in high school, you know, your teachers were at the top of the pyramid, right? Like, you do not go up to your teacher's desk and demand or not that this person even demanded, but you didn't say anything.

Usually your teacher told you and you sat and did whatever you were supposed to do. And it broke my heart in that he was on his own and having to stand up in front of the class. I mean, class members heard that, right?

And that's just a. I don't know. I just saw that as such a huge, I think about my own kids or now my grandkids having to do something like that without, you know.

I think there are a lot of things that we're doing and many things that we need to do. I spend a lot of time walking around. I like to secret shop so that I can see what needs to be improved. High on my list is ready for launch.

And ready for launch is a partnership. And if it hadn't been for Michelle and Cap can.

I'm not sure that we would have been able to develop orientation for students who are on the autism spectrum. And then we broaden that to all neuro diverse students.

Gives them an opportunity in an environment, a place that's more quiet, more accommodating, same information. As a society, we don't have a whole lot of awareness. Big piece is awareness.

And so if I have a student, because we welcome these students who needs to stand in the back of the room and just jump up and down as fast as he can in order to recenter in order to bring his processing, his brain, his stress level to a point that it's more manageable. We have conversations like that at the very beginning of the orientation.

And we teach skills that focus on advocacy so that they don't have to tell that instructor over and over again what they're eligible for. And they also know they have a person, they have a place. It's called our center for Student Education Access.

They have a person called Academic Success coach individuals that they meet during that orientation so that they can feel safer, less stigmatized, and learn that their request is not out of the norm. We are not going to assume that they're not capable because they're asking for for what they need to be successful.

The other thing that LCC has done, even before we began this process to studying neurodiversity, was offering the service of going to the high school and participating in a student's transitional iep, which is their individual education plan when they are seniors in high school getting ready to graduate. And so to be able to take the center for Student Access to team and be part of that final transition. IEP is critical for planning a.

It introduces the student to the person who they will actually be working with when they get over to LCC to set up all of the accommodations that they are eligible for.

But it's also an opportunity for LCC to answer questions and for the team at the K12 to better understand what LCC does actually offer in support of students who are neurodiverse.

Absolutely.

That's a great partnership that you've fostered for a number of years now.

Yeah. Patti, did you know, probably not. That Tech careers under the coordination of Danny lafleur has what they call lab day.

And they specifically focus on individuals, not just high school students, who are neurodiverse, who are interested in skilled traits so that they can actually visit West Campus. They can go to an auto lab.

They can hear the noises that are in a welding lab so that they can get accustomed to the sensitivities, the sound variants of different programs and better decide if it's a program, a pathway that's suitable for them.

Wow, that is amazing.

Isn't that amazing?

It is.

You know, this sounds ridiculous and it probably doesn't coincide, but I was thinking about the nursing students that don't realize they can't be a nurse until they see the blood and they see it. And then they freak out and they're like, I can't do this. It would be kind of the same idea. You're just kind of getting them used to it and then say.

And then they opt out if that's not gonna work. And it probably wouldn't work for me either. In certain settings. It's like you said, it's not really a label. It's that.

How does it work with each individual?

Exactly.

It's back to that match and fit.

Match and fit. Patty, I like that that's her new little model. I know. Match and Fit.

I love Match and Fit also. It applies to shopping, so it's great. What were you going to say?

I was just going to say, did you know that we have a partnership with Peckham?

Oh, yes.

Because LCC isn't always the best match or fit at a particular time. And so our own Lisa Webb Sharp, who is the chief operating officer at Peckham, has been working with us. And Michelle has been very involved with the.

That partnership and the connection it has with Michigan Reconnect.

Oh, now that I didn't realize.

Yeah.

So we want to make sure that folks that are on the team at Pecum who are interested in continuing their education can take advantage of their Reconnect scholarship, which was fortunately just lowered back down to 21 again. Yay.

Yay.

But Petcom has been great about making sure that there's an embedded admissions advisor available to the staff there to help walk their team members through the process, just like we do at the high school level with college advisors to help them with their applications, their financial aid, their scholarship, whether it's Reconnect or your own LCC scholarship, just to navigate all those steps. And then Peckham has set aside time in that person's work workday for them to actually attend classes.

So their team members are getting paid essentially to go to class.

Oh, my goodness.

And so this allows for them to have essentially upward mobility within Pecum because they may have started as an entry level team member, but they could move up to the next level because they've now completed a certificate or an associate's degree degree using that Reconnect Scholarship through the process.

You know, it's interesting because when I was reading some of the materials actually from the report from Landmark and all of the things that your focus groups and things had done, sometimes you look at it from a lens of what we're doing for the student. But really, organizations, whether it's a workplace or higher ed, they're also learning and benefiting from this.

In the fact that you're going to get people that look at things in a different way that might be a more effective way to do something. Are there other benefits that we would see?

Maybe just the immersion in public life in general, so that as a society we become more aware, you know, if someone's acting out on a plane, we don't just assume what's wrong with that person. Exactly.

This is someone that has difficult calming themselves, maybe have some organizational challenges. Right.

Yeah.

So you mentioned Landmark. We aren't Doing this in a vacuum. What are some things that has come out of that whole process with Landmark?

So many. Michelle and I just got back from Vermont. We attended the summer institute at Landmark along with two of our psychology professors.

We were able to present the project, how we started, where we are now, the work groups, all of the information you've been reading. It was so nice to connect and learn and be in the same rooms with individuals from all over the nation who are just as committed and interested in.

In the work, doing the work, and providing space not only for students, but also for staff, for employees. That's also very important. We'll be doing an article in the Higher Ed Chronicle, which is nice, very, very exciting. And it's actually an interview.

We're going to be interviewed. And Landmark suggested that the Chronicle contact us in order to interview us.

So there are so many benefits that have come out of that study and that relationship with Landmark.

Wow.

We've been going to different conferences since COVID to be able to better understand what is the need and what could be our role and then how to implement best practices.

And I think what's been exciting is that this really has been a collaborative partnership across the community with LCC and with other higher ed partners. And the learning that we've done, we've now been able to share and spread with others, not only at lcc, but back out in the community.

And it's fostered interesting conversations with. With other partners who are just starting to understand to your point earlier, that, oh, yeah, this actually has an impact on the workforce.

And I hadn't thought about the fact that the noise in my office is a barrier to someone performing. Well. We're creating quiet, safe spaces for students to go and take a break here at Lansing Community College.

But it's also making faculty members aware that sometimes a student might need to remove themselves briefly from the classroom to just go and get reset and then come back in and reengage or, you know, make sure that those accommodations really are provided for those students. And yeah, we give a student and rely upon a student to submit. I forget what the letter's called to the faculty. Thank you.

But part of the thing that we've learned about the students that we are typically referring to in neurodiversity is that they may not have the organizational functioning to remember to do that when they're stressed.

Right, right.

And so it's for faculty members to maybe say, can I just ask, do you have an instructor memo for me that I need to take a look at? And then the student might say, oh, yeah, right. I forgot. Supposed to bring that to you. So it's that back and forth, that conversation. Not.

And it makes it less taboo now. Exactly. Before, it was like, what can I ask you? I don't want to blow up your privacy here in the middle of class, but also that type of thing.

I do have a question going back a little bit. When you talked about the people that attended the conference in Vermont.

Are we the only community college in Michigan that is looking at this and working with Landmark, or do we not know?

Or there are other community colleges that are involved with the work. I don't know whether they're working with Landmark or not, but Grand Rapids is doing Work Delta as well.

I recently had a WebEx meeting with the University of Michigan and Ann Arbor.

Oh, wow.

They presented at our Michigan ACE Conference. And that's how I connected with them. Oh, my goodness. They are doing amazing work. They call the work that they're doing a project.

And we're definitely going to connect. The representative indicated that University of Michigan cannot take the lead.

I tried to get our community colleges to unite and had approached Delta about them taking the lead for maybe a regional presence. After we met at the College Access Network Summit a few years ago, no one stepped up. And I understand why. And I indicated LCC can't.

And so it sounds as if there's already work afoot. University of Michigan was the convener, but Eastern Michigan University may take the lead.

So I am excited that LCC can be part of what's going on in Michigan, so we all can learn together, but we don't necessarily have to take the lead because we have a lot on our plate at LCC right now.

Right.

I don't understand everything about it, and I'm gonna make my blunders, too.

So what can we do as an organization to help in that so that people come to their jobs prepared to understand that student jumping in the corner or whatever is happening?

So, Patty, being on our advisory board for the College and Career Readiness Initiative, you put probably have a lot more inside information than many. We're building an awareness campaign. And Addis is a multimedia company that we contracted to do quite A bit of work for us in that area.

Our own LCC Media Services, they've done quite a bit of work as well. When I said did you know that's actually a campaign and employees are going to start seeing did you knows on our screens very soon.

Robert Edwards did an amazing job with our word of the day, week, month, I think it's day and we have all sorts of terms that are associated with neurodiversity. There are videos on the website right now. Katie Pomater, who is an amazing communications faculty member.

Two of her videos are on our website at LCC.edu C3R. We're getting the information out, the recommendations that we've reviewed and there are three.

One focuses on professional development so that we can start integrating information concerning neurodiversity into our new employee orientation. We have know how in 90 for administrators and others.

So you're going to see more and more of that built into our existing professional development and training.

Perfect.

I also want to make sure that we recognize our staff and our employees because they're our employees. Faculty that also need to have support. I've had at least three employees over the years and we've worked with HR because of their needs.

All neurodiverse and there were low cost, no cost things that they needed. Dimming the lights in their office, being able to take a break, go to a quiet space if they felt a migraine going on.

Our HR is very, very supportive in that regard.

Sora is that.

Did all of that come about because of proposals that you put forth to administration saying these are the things that we see that need to happen or change. And I know we've had a quiet space for some time and are there others that you're proposing?

There are others that we're proposing. That spot is not really designated as a sensory room. So there are some things that we need to organize. And Patty, part of it is I've worked in hr.

That's why we have to really help our administrators know that many of these things as it relates to our employees, they were already in place. Our managers just aren't always aware.

That makes sense. Anything else like next steps? Anything else to add to this?

Well, I think we want to invite the community to be engaged and following what we're doing. We certainly have different opportunities that are public that folks can come in. As Tony referred to out at Career Tech.

We need more families to think about the college going process for their students early on.

Don't just wait until senior year of high school to ask the questions that are necessary in order to facilitate a positive transition for our students who are neurodiverse. That should be a conversation that's happening in middle school, certainly, and the hope and the dream is possible.

I think that's really helpful for us to continue to talk about this as a whole community.

Well, thank you both so much.

You are such trailblazers when it comes to supporting students and sometimes having to think outside the box so that we can be that support and create that community. And so I really appreciate you. I appreciate you being on the show today.

So thank you.

Thank you everyone for stopping by the Star Zone. This is Patty Spagnuolo, wishing you well.

Thanks for joining us here on the StarZone. For more information on this episode, visit lccconnect.org. You can also find a complete list of Lansing Community College events by visiting lcc.edu/calendar. Until next time, thanks for getting into the Zone.