Bridging the gap between FE and HE for Autistic students

Fabri’s research identified five key challenges to autistic students continuing education at HE level:

1. The accessibility of the social and physical environment at university,  
2. lack of appropriate support,  
3. the unrealistic expectations of the students themselves,  
4. challenges concerning planning and assessment, and  
5. the wider issues and challenges involved into transitioning to adult life. 

Recommendations were devised in response to these key challenges and a two-pronged approach adopted: 1) increasing autism understanding amongst academics and support staff and providing advice that can easily be put into action; and 2) helping autistic young people to better understand what to expect at university and how to effectively advocate for themselves.  

The project resulted in the creation of three Autism&Uni Best-Practice Guides targeting HEI managers and senior academics; HE lecturers and tutors; and professionals supporting autistic students, respectively, and the Autism&Uni online toolkit aimed at autistic students and their families.

Fabri adopted a holistic and participatory approach to the toolkit’s design, giving the end users real influence in designing solutions for the challenges they are facing. The Autism&Uni team used human-centred design approaches for the toolkit’s development; research into website design for autism was undertaken through several participatory design and prototyping workshops with autistic young adults. 

Since their launch, over 8000 copies of Fabri’s Autism&Uni Best Practice Guides have been downloaded and copies have been distributed in 8 languages across Europe. The guides have raised autism awareness and positively affected the practice of a majority of the surveyed University professionals. Fabri’s Autism&Uni toolkit and the guides for HE professionals have provided transition support for students at University of Birmingham, University College London, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland, Dublin City University, Ireland, University of Bath, University of Sheffield, Durham University, Portsmouth University, Falmouth Exeter Plus, University of Warsaw, Poland, and Leeds Beckett University. Currently a further 11 universities are trialling the toolkit: London School of Economics, University of Southampton, University College Cork, University of St Andrews, University of Suffolk, Staffordshire University, University for the Creative Arts, Liverpool Hope, Keele University, University of Limerick, Ireland, University of Swansea.  

Other language versions are also underway: The Autism&Uni toolkit has recently been translated into Polish by the team around Dr Mateusz Platos in the Faculty of Psychology, University of Warsaw. Dr Nicolas Ruffieux at the University of Fribourg in Switzerland has secured funding to translate the toolkit intro French. Katie Quinn, Youth Engagement and Programmes Officer at the charity ‘As I Am’ which gives support to Autistic people and their families explained the positive impact and practical application of the toolkit in supporting autistic student’s transition into HE, “we have found that everyone that we’ve worked with and spoken to about the toolkit has said that this is brilliant information for everybody.” 

The Autism&Uni toolkit and Autism&Uni Guides continue to benefit autistic students and their families, and HE professionals. Currently Fabri is leading another EU-funded project, the IMAGE project, focusing on improving the employability of autistic graduates in Europe.