UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — Penn State World Campus will train its staff on working with students on the autism spectrum in an effort to better serve them as online learners.
Jane Brown, a national autism expert from Yale University, will conduct two training sessions at Penn State on April 10 that any University employee can attend. The sessions will be from 9 to 10 a.m. and 10:30 to 11:30 a.m. in Room 121 G/H of the Outreach Building at Innovation Park.
The sessions also will be streamed online for anyone to view.
Brown, the director of College Autism Spectrum and an assistant clinical professor at Yale’s School of Medicine, will cover topics such as the best practices to keep students with autism in college, for providing flexibility for course requirements, managing group conflict and more.
“We want to provide Penn State World Campus staff, such as academic advisers and student support personnel with the best practices for working with students on the spectrum,” said Terry Watson, the disability contact liaison for Penn State World Campus. “In order to ensure that we can meet the University’s mission of being inclusive, it’s critically important to understand the barriers that higher education presents for this student population.”