Antioch University is a private university with multiple campuses in the United States and online programs. It is the offshoot of Antioch College, which was founded in 1852. Antioch College's first president was politician, abolitionist, and education reformer Horace Mann. In 1977, the College network was re-incorporated as Antioch University to reflect its growth across the country into numerous graduate education programs. It operates four campuses located in three states, as well as an online division and the Graduate School of Leadership and Change. All campuses of the university are regionally accredited by the Higher Learning Commission.
Facilitated communication (FC), or supported typing, is a scientifically discredited technique that claims to allow non-verbal people, such as those with autism, to communicate. The technique involves a facilitator guiding the disabled person's arm or hand in an attempt to help them type on a keyboard or other such device which they are unable to properly use if unfacilitated.
Antioch University New England is a private graduate school located in Keene, New Hampshire, United States. It is part of the Antioch University system, a private, non-profit, 501(c)(3) institution that includes campuses in Seattle, Washington; Los Angeles, California; and Santa Barbara, California. It is accredited by the Higher Learning Commission. The most well-known campus was Antioch College in Yellow Springs, Ohio, which is now independent of the Antioch University system.
Emotional and behavioral disorders refer to a disability classification used in educational settings that allows educational institutions to provide special education and related services to students who have displayed poor social and/or academic progress.
The Judge Rotenberg Center (JRC) is a controversial institution in Canton, Massachusetts, United States, for people with developmental disabilities and emotional and behavioral disorders. The center has been condemned for torture by the United Nations special rapporteur on torture. The JRC is known for its use of the graduated electronic decelerator (GED), a device that administers electric shocks to residents as part of the institution's behavior modification program.
The Autistic Self Advocacy Network (ASAN) is an American 501(c)(3) nonprofit advocacy organization run by and for individuals on the autism spectrum. ASAN advocates for the inclusion of autistic people in decisions that affect them, including: legislation, depiction in the media, and disability services.
The Kennedy Krieger Institute is a nonprofit, 501(c)(3) tax-exempt, Johns Hopkins affiliate located in Baltimore, Maryland, that provides in-patient and out-patient medical care, community services, and school-based programs for children and adolescents with learning disabilities, as well as disorders of the brain, spinal cord, and musculoskeletal system. The Institute provides services for children with developmental concerns mild to severe and is involved in research of various disorders, including new interventions and earlier diagnosis.
The Barber National Institute is a nonprofit, multi-faceted organization that provides services to more than 6,300 children, adults, and families who are faced with autism, intellectual disabilities, and behavioral health challenges. The institute's central facility was founded in 1952 and is located in Erie, Pennsylvania. The Barber National Institute now employs more than 3,000 staff members throughout the state.
Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) is a public school district in Los Angeles, California, United States. It is the largest public school system in California in terms of number of students and the 2nd largest public school district in the United States, with only the New York City Department of Education having a larger student population. During the 2022–2023 school year, LAUSD served 565,479 students, including 11,795 early childhood education students and 27,740 adult students. During the same school year, it had 24,769 teachers and 49,231 other employees. It is the second largest employer in Los Angeles County after the county government. The school district's budget for the 2021–2022 school year was $10.7 billion, increasing to $12.6 billion for the 2022–2023 school year.
Neal King, is a retired American educator, writer, consultant and psychologist. He is President-Emeritus, and former chair of the Board of Directors, of the International Association of University Presidents. He is also President Emeritus of Antioch University Los Angeles and Sofia University in Palo Alto, California.
Autism-friendly means being aware of social engagement and environmental factors affecting people on the autism spectrum, with modifications to communication methods and physical space to better suit individual's unique and special needs.
Discrimination against autistic people is the discrimination, persecution, and oppression that autistic people have been subjected to. Discrimination against autistic people is a form of ableism.
The rapid prompting method (RPM) is a pseudoscientific technique that attempts to aid communication by people with autism or other disabilities to communicate through pointing, typing, or writing. Also known as Spelling to Communicate, it is closely related to the scientifically discredited technique facilitated communication (FC). Practitioners of RPM have failed to assess the issue of message agency using simple and direct scientific methodologies, saying that doing so would be stigmatizing and that allowing scientific criticisms of the technique robs people with autism of their right to communicate. The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association has issued a statement opposing the practice of RPM.
The Picture Exchange Communication System (PECS) is an augmentative and alternative communication system developed and produced by Pyramid Educational Consultants, Inc. PECS was developed in 1985 at the Delaware Autism Program by Andy Bondy, PhD, and Lori Frost, MS, CCC-SLP. The developers of PECS noticed that traditional communication techniques, including speech imitation, sign language, and picture point systems, relied on the teacher to initiate social interactions and none focused on teaching students to initiate interactions. Based on these observations, Bondy and Frost created a functional means of communication for individuals with a variety of communication challenges. Although PECS was originally developed for young children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), its use has become much more widespread. Through the years, PECS has been successfully implemented with individuals with varying diagnoses across the aged span. PECS is an evidence-based practice that has been highly successful with regard to the development of functional communication skills.
Morénike Giwa Onaiwu is an American educator, author, and autism and HIV advocate. Alongside E. Ashkenazy and Lydia Brown, Onaiwu is an editor of All the Weight of Our Dreams, an anthology of art and writing entirely by autistic people of color published by the Autism Women's Network in June 2017.
On November 30, 2018, 13-year-old Max Benson, an autistic boy from Davis, California, died at the hospital from cardiac complications as a result of being held in an extended prone physical restraint by staff at his now-defunct K-12 non-public school, Guiding Hands School in El Dorado County, California where he was placed a few months before by Davis Joint Unified School District who denied Max and two other students a Free and Appropriate Education (FAPE).
The graduated electronic decelerator (GED) is a device that delivers powerful electric shocks to the skin, described by the United Nations as torture, created by Matthew Israel for use on people at the Judge Rotenberg Center as part of the institution's behavior modification program. The school has since been condemned for torture by the United Nations special rapporteur on torture for its use of the GED and other inhumane punishments. In 2020, the device was banned in the United States by the Food and Drug Administration, however the ban was overturned in federal court a year later. In response, congress amended the Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act to expand FDA's authority to ban such devices.
Matthew Israel is a controversial American behavioral psychologist who is known for founding the Judge Rotenberg Center and inventing the Graduated Electronic Decelerator. As a freshman in college, Israel read B. F. Skinner's novel, Walden Two, in which the heroes build a utopia by conditioning the residents of a commune through the behaviorist principles of reward and punishment. Israel said that reading Walden Two was like a "religious conversion" for him. After reading the book, Israel devoted himself to making the utopia described in it a reality. Israel said that the period between reading the book and his first attempts to start the utopia was a very difficult time of his life. "I thought about committing suicide," he said. "If I couldn't bring a community into existence, [in] what sense was life worth living?" Israel went on to study behaviorism under B. F. Skinner and to receive his Ph.D. from Harvard University in 1960.
Havasupai Elementary School (HES) is a Bureau of Indian Education (BIE)-operated K–6 school in Supai, Arizona. It serves the Havasupai Indian Reservation.
