Being an Autism Ally: Navigating Advocacy and Inclusivity
I started my career in autism services and support in 1983. I was a respite provider to a family, spending time with a super-cool 8-year-old named Shari. I kept this job through college where I was studying to be a special education teacher. I then started supporting students in educational settings, and my career has now included working in education, health care, tech, and more. In all of these settings, I understood my role in supporting autistic individuals to have access to a full life rich with relationships, opportunities, and happiness.
As my lived experience grew with maturity, I started to identify as an ally to the autism community. I began to realize how people with autism and disabilities were marginalized and that I needed to act as an ally, as described by Douthiert-Cohen et al. (2013), one that interrupts oppression and injustice. As a special education teacher, this meant advocating with the school administration to ensure that my students had access to extracurricular activities, including school dances—activities they had been excluded from. Later in my career, this allyship advanced to taking an active role in advocating for policy change by visiting my legislators and writing letters to my congressional........
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