Presenters: Cassandra Evans, Ph.D. and Becca Joy Stout, M.S., CUNY School of Professional Studies

Wilson and Dallman (2024) note that neurodivergent students have only a 39 percent graduation rate in higher education. This number does not align with what educators anticipated national disability inclusion laws would promote. Nor does it align with “CUNYverse”  best practices.  

What is being done to bridge this gap? Neurodivergent students themselves indicate a need for greater “awareness and acceptance on campuses to address stigma and mitigate some of the social difficulties they experience” (Wilson and Dallman, 2024).  At the same time, faculty facilitating skills-based courses need guidance. Knowledge about neurodiversity, mental health disabilities and autism have increased, but attitudes and assignment-based inclusion are not always in line with reported awareness.  Re-design may start from these entry points:
•    How can pathologized minds remain comfortably on the periphery and yet also be allowed to thrive as what Janis Jenkins (2015) refashioned as “extraordinary minds.”  
•    How can we promote student-centered spaces for neurodiverse graduate students while still giving them realistic expectations of deadline-heavy professions?

Cassandra Evans, Ph.D., Adjunct Assistant Professor in Disability Studies at CUNY School of Professional Studies moderates a panel of SPS graduate grant writing students who identify as neurodivergent, who are thinking in terms of their own mental health, their social inclusion, and their supports while simultaneously navigating a rigorous and time-sensitive graduate school course: Grant writing.