There are times when I’m playing solitaire on my phone or computer and realize there has been a good move available for at least several draws from the deck. These moments frustrate me, as I have to admit to not seeing what is suddenly so obvious. Move the cards, open…
Category: Education
Posts on teaching, studying, educational systems, and institutions.
Duke University historian Nancy MacLean is currently a trendy historian who spent 2017 touring and promoting her book Democracy in Chains. The book has some serious scholarship flaws, which have been addressed by Henry Farrell and Steven Teles on Vox, a website considered progressive on most issues. MacLean has made the stunning…
When did I ‘become’ the autistic me? That’s a complex question and one that raises questions about the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders from the American Psychiatric Association. This post, however, does not engage in a debate over the DSM-IV and DSM5 criteria for autism. Instead, I wanted to…
Atypical students are, at least according to current data, attracted to the STEM fields. Neurodiverse individuals feel safer in those academic and professional fields with concrete questions and problems, with clear approaches to best answers. Autism is, by definition, a concrete form of processing information and a communication disorder. We think differently…
Required college composition courses often serve a gatekeeping function, ensuring that only the right sort of students advance towards degrees. Though anecdotal, every campus course-related hearing I’ve been involved in as an expert on autism and neurodiversity was a writing course. These were not always first-year composition, but they were…
Autistic students and their parents contact me all-too-often about writing courses at colleges and universities. For some reason, writing pedagogies (the theories and methods instructors embrace) prove particularly problematic for students with disabilities. Writing courses are tailored for the “normal” students, those without any physical, cognitive, or mental health challenges. Much…
The situation, which represents at least three or four emails I receive per school year: A student requests exemptions from collaborative assignments and participation grades. The professor declines. Disability studies office asks me what the right solution is to this conflict. More often than I would like, this occurs in…
College and university disability offices often ask me to address the issue of assignment deadlines and test accommodations for autistic students and those with other “invisible” disabilities. Professors and instructors often decline to offer deadline extensions and test accommodations, arguing that such adjustments unfairly benefit students with special needs. If…
Academic departments in the humanities rarely understand the social impairments of autism. These departments are, by their nature, social places — quite unlike some departments in the STEM disciplines. I’ve blogged repeatedly that STEM fields tolerate introversion and even social awkwardness, but not the humanities. This claim is based not…
Navigating school requires social skills, and often the most successful academically are also successful socially. Despite the stereotypes of jocks and nerds, geeks and goths, consider actual data. To participate in athletics, a minimum GPA is required. I recall the star athletes from my high school and today those individuals…