Thinking of College for 2e Students

Are you stressed about what the future looks like for your 2e child? Will your 2e kids be ready for college? What do they need to think about in high school to be ready for college? Will colleges support such unique learners? How do kids who are intellectually bright but struggling in school because of a learning disability going to present to colleges? Dr. Marci Schwartz joined us to talk about what colleges do to support kids with unique learning profiles, what the considerations are for parents and students as they move through the high school years, success stories, colleges that are open and supportive, and more. Hear her insights to help alleviate a lot of the fear and anxiety parents have about their 2e kids' futures as well as practical tools and tips for navigating the high school years with an eye on the future. Dr. Marci Schwartz started Thrive College Counseling where she works with students with unique learning profiles. She began Thrive College Counseling in order to offer students an opportunity to learn the skills necessary for independence, and provide support in locating the best college fit to meet their educational and social/emotional needs.

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Read the Video Transcript here:

"I'm Yael Valek, and I'm a co-founder of REEL, and I'm joined tonight by my co-founder, Callie Turk. For those of you who are new to REEL, welcome. For those of you who have been part of our journey, we're excited to be together again.

At REEL, we work to build bridges between twice-exceptional learners, their educators, and their parents. In case you're not familiar with twice-exceptional or 2E, they are learners who experience both exceptional strengths as well as learning differences.

Before I introduce our speaker, I just want to let you know how we're going to run the session. We're using the webinar function in Zoom, so everyone's video and audio are turned off. We gathered a lot of questions during the registration, so thank you everyone for submitting those. Most of those questions will be answered by Marcy's presentation, but feel free to use the Q&A button to submit any other questions. We'll monitor them and pose as many of them to Marcy throughout and after the presentation as we can. Also, feel free to use the chat feature to post comments, though we're not going to monitor that for questions.

We are recording the session and we will be sending out the link and further instructions so you can watch it again later. If you have to jump off the call early but would like more information about REEL, please visit our website, which is www.reel2e.org.

In past parent meetups, lots of our members have expressed interest in better understanding the transitions that our children will face. We've heard a lot of anxiety from our parents about what the future looks like for their 2E children. So we're very excited to welcome Dr. Marcy Schwartz, who will help us all better understand how to prepare for the transition from high school to college for 2e students as well as offer true-life stories from her work.

Marcy founded Thrive College Counseling in order to support teens with learning differences make the difficult but important transition to adulthood. College Thrive Counseling works with students to discover their best college fit in order to ensure a successful transition to the college or program of their choice after high school. She received her Ph.D. from New York University and began her career as a therapist. Marcy uses her experience as a clinician to work with students to understand and develop the skills necessary to be confidently prepared to attend college or other post-high school programs.

She is an adjunct clinical associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at the Stanford University School of Medicine. We met Marcy through the Stanford Neurodiversity Project's K-12 work group and we knew right away that she'd be a great person to bring to our REEL family. So welcome, Marcy."

Dr. Marcy Schwartz's Presentation

"Thank you. It's great to be here and it was great working with you both on our committee. I'm sorry that it never happened because of coronavirus, but hopefully in the future. Whoops. Okay. So, I'm going to jump right in and I'm going to get started by talking about the differences between high school and college, and then I'm going to talk a bit about some of the main skills that are good to be aware of when you're working with your students and preparing them for that transition. And I will be taking questions as they come up and at the end.

Differences Between High School and College for 2e Students

"So, the first thing to start out with is understanding how high school is different than college because it is quite different. In high school, the goal of the experience of high school and educating your students is to help them to achieve success. So when you have an IEP or a 504 meeting, the adults are gathered around and they're figuring out, 'How can we help the student be successful? What could we modify? What can we change? What... you know, how can we make any differences in the curriculum to engage the student?' All of the conversations, the supports, and the discussion are around success for that child.

In college, that is not the case. I mean, clearly, they want them to be successful—the college students—but their goal is different. The laws are different, and the goals are different. In college, the goal is to give the student access to resources. So if a student... if you look at a visually impaired student, the goal of the college is not to find that visually impaired student on campus and say, 'Let me help you and let me figure out all the things you need to be successful on campus.' The goal is for the student to go to the disability office and say, 'I have a visual impairment. These are my needs. How can you give me access to the curriculum so I can learn at my best?' And then the school needs to do that.

So the whole energy around getting services is just very different. The main goal of that for you, for families, to understand is that the student is going to need to advocate for what they need in order to get access. Whereas, you see in K through 12, you might ask for those resources, but it's up to the school to meet with you and to make sure that that happens. The adults are really in charge of that.

As you can see in the second bullet point here, the school has primary responsibility for arranging the accommodations. As I mentioned, in college, the student has the primary responsibility for that. I will say it's not just a one-stop-shopping thing where the student goes up to the disability office, advocates that one time, the disability office says, 'Yes, you're going to have extended time on tests. These are your list of your accommodations. Awesome.' And the student is done. That's so not true. The student needs to take those accommodations and bring it to the professor and say, 'Hey English professor, I need to take my test in a quiet room. I get these accommodations.' And that's how it happens. Then when that semester ends and they get a new set of teachers the next semester, they need to have that conversation and have it again. So, self-advocacy is an ongoing piece of the college experience when it comes to the accommodations the student needs.

In high school, the parents have access to the student's records and are really a part of all these meetings. In college, parents do not have access, and the disability offices in colleges are not... you know, they love it when parents come in initially just to kind of help, but then they want the parents to leave. This is really supposed to be a student-centered time in college, and the colleges are going to be pushing that. There are some waivers that students can sign to give parents access to the grades and to be able to speak with disability offices, and that's something that definitely happens for a variety of reasons, whether it's medical reasons or other things. So there are ways for parents to be able to have that access that's more similar to high school, but there are some hoops that one needs to jump through, and the student's going to have to be okay with it as well.

In high school, teachers can modify the curriculum and say, 'Oh, I know that you really like reading these kinds of books. So in this class, we're reading this book, but you read this other book because I know you'll get through it, it'll be less anxiety-provoking,' or whatever. That's making a modification in the curriculum, and that's really not going to probably happen in college. It's just a different standard of what professors are willing to do around changing the curriculum.

And also around tutoring: right now, your students might... you might be paying for tutoring or getting extra tutoring that's part of the IEP. It's actually better in college that there's tutoring for pretty much everything 24/7 in some schools, that you don't... it's available to everybody. So if a student wants tutoring, that's not a problem in college because it's not something that falls under the disability office. I could go into more detail because there are different levels of tutoring and types of tutoring as I'm sure many of you guys are aware of. So there's more specialized educational support that could be available, but just straight-up tutoring is just part of the college experience, which is nice.

College Support Models

"Colleges are going to offer different levels of support for students. The compliance model is the basic one. The majority of colleges receive federal funding. Those who don't, that are more religious, are going to be different. If they're not receiving federal funding, they don't have to follow the ADA, and so it's a little bit different, but the majority of colleges are going to have to have a compliance model. This basically means that they're going to provide anything that's considered standard, which would be giving basic access. So, if it is a visually impaired student, in order to give access, they're going to have to make sure that whatever material the student needs to read will be an audiobook or Braille—whatever accommodations that school's students have agreed upon—then that needs to happen. And that's a basic giving access to that student to the education that they are paying tuition for.

So, note-takers, extended time on tests, testing in a quiet room—those are some of the basic ones that you can expect to be able to get. Many schools will want a neuro-psych eval or an updated eval. It could be or just an IEP or a 504 or some documentation that the student received these types of supports in high school, and therefore many of the colleges will be able to offer that without too much difficulty in a college setting. When students are asking for things outside of something basic, then they're going to want to see more documentation.

I was just listening this morning to a webinar from a disability office at a college, and they were talking a lot about how they get requests for housing. They want... they want access to their own room, and the student says, 'Well, I have anxiety,' and they have no documentation about it. 'But because I have anxiety, I want my own room, and I don't want to have a roommate.' So many colleges are not going to be awesome with that without any documentation. Some students might say, 'Well, I just met a therapist twice. My therapist, my new therapist, says that I need that.' It's really going to be a judgment call with the college to say the level of documentation they're going to need for requests like that. But for compliance, it's going to be some of the basic stuff.

The moderate programs are colleges that offer resources for students without an extra fee. They've just decided that they want to do more for students. So they might have executive functioning workshops. They will have peer mentors that if the student is having difficulty joining a club and they just need somebody to go with them, they feel comfortable, they have some social anxiety, then they might have that type of a program. They might have a tutoring club or just something that... you know, different things that they offer students to help them feel more connected. Some will have them start if you're part of the disability office, like you've registered, then they might have a couple of earlier days of orientation before the rest of the campus comes on. So there's a lot of different things that colleges are doing now to really increase the comfort of the students so that they can get their bearings. But they're not... but they're still there. They're basic services on steroids, but they're still basic. That would be the moderate.

Now comprehensive, that's a whole other thing. For the comprehensive, it's almost like a giant resource room at the college that you pay an extra fee. They will... you show up there multiple times a week. The student just... he knows, he walks in, 'Hey Johnny, how was that test yesterday? It was fine. Open up your backpack, let's see what's going on. How is this professor?' Like you get a... your student is known. They know people to go to. If they say, 'I'm having trouble with my roommate,' 'Oh, let's figure out about that.' And they'll go and they'll walk with them. 'Where can we go and how can we get help?' And so that is more comprehensive. And within all of these, I can tell you school A has a comprehensive program and school B is a comprehensive program, but they're going to be different. But it definitely indicates that whatever the need of that student is, if that student has dyslexia and they need a comprehensive program, there are colleges that offer comprehensive programs for students with dyslexia. But that same college that we're saying, 'Oh, that's a great comprehensive program,' if you have a student with autism, it may not be great. So just because it's comprehensive doesn't mean it's right for everybody. It means that that's a great comprehensive program for that particular type of student. So it gets into the weeds a little bit, but you should just know as parents that there are those resources out there.

Skills for College Readiness

"Okay, so now we're going to talk a little bit about some of the skills that are good to be aware of as parents. Whether you have an elementary-age kid, a middle schooler, or a high schooler, these are things to be starting to address, developmentally appropriately, because these are the skills.

Self-advocacy is the first one. I'm going to tell you what I'm expecting of students when they are seniors in high school about to go off to college, which is right this very second. I just had a conversation with a family today. They're just on the cusp, they can't quite decide: do they go to a school with a comprehensive program—it's an awesome program, a great fit for the student—or do they take a gap year and go to... they would take college classes but they would live with people who are academically capable but need a little bit more time to build the self-advocacy and the independent living skills?

Just today, I was having a conversation with a family, and I asked them this question: 'Do you feel that your son is capable of independently, without prompting, consistently and in a timely way, knowing that he needs help and being able to know who he has to go to and ask for help and actually articulate that he needs help?' And it was very... you know, the both parents are like, 'Oh no, not like that.' So when you say self-advocacy, I think it's easy to think, 'Yeah, well, I told my kid to ask the math teacher for, you know, help on his math and he did.' Well, that's awesome, but that's... that's... it's awesome on the developmental line, but if you're a senior about to go off to college and you're that... if you think about the prompting that needed to be able to go on that, then it's not so ready. So self-advocacy is something that you want to build over time so that the student is able to do that more independently. Even if they can't, even if they're college-capable academically but they're not ready in this area, like, just for my example, there was another program that we had all set for this kid. So it's really just a question of, you know, he was accepted to both. We have many options. It's really now the parents' and the student's decision as to the fit. But from worrying about, 'Is there a place for my child based on their readiness?' there is. But you want to... the goal is, 'Let's build up these skills as much as possible while they're at home,' and then we'll figure out what their next step is after high school.

So, I kind of went through that. So we're good. Oh, and the other thing with this is that it's not just academic, it's interpersonal. Like, 'If you're having trouble with your roommate, medical, does the student know when they're sick and say, 'I think I have a fever. I don't know what to do,' and at least call the parent and say, 'I think I have a fever. I don't know...' but at least they're doing something as opposed to just going to class and not feeling well. So that self-advocacy needs to happen in more than just the academic.

Social skills are another big piece. And I get a lot of questions or... you know, we have a lot, I have a lot of discussions with families where students tend to not... for all families, but there are certain situations where the student is around the same people for many years. There are some schools that they are in the same elementary through middle school, middle school through high school. And so there is such a comfort and such a familiarity, and their social network may not be that broad. And so there is a high comfort level, which is awesome because then you see the student feeling good about themselves, high self-esteem, very competent. But then when I ask a family in that situation, 'If there was a substitute teacher in that comfortable bubble, would that student talk to them and have a discussion and ask for help? Or if a new student joined the school, how would that go?' Then you can kind of get a sense about, 'Okay, so how good is...' you know, when I ask, 'How are the social skills?' and it's all through a lens of comfort. We need to look outside of that lens of comfort and make sure that the student is able to use those same social skills that they use when they're comfortable when they're not comfortable, or at least ask for help to figure out how to get comfortable with that other person. Because when students go off to college, everything is new. Roommates are new, classmates are new, professors are new, the dining hall is new—everything is new. So just be mindful of when you're thinking about your child's social skills. It's not just, 'How are they doing with familiar?' but be aware of the unfamiliar. But if you have like a fourth-grader, don't worry about that. It's like... this is like looking at more of a trajectory. In fourth grade, you're really building confidence and basic skills. But if you have a high schooler, this is something to really think about. So, just kind of... I know that there's a wide range of ages, so just... you know your children, and I'm talking about more of a range.

Independent Living Skills

"So, independent living skills, this covers a lot. Will the student do chores? Are you prompting them to brush their teeth? Shower is a big thing that's always an interesting question. 'Will your child shower independently?' If I ask it like that, 'Yes, they will shower independently after I've prompted them to shower,' meaning that yes, they know they will wash their hair, they know how to wash their hair once they're in the shower. But so this is a tricky question, and you have to ask it in many different ways to make sure that... obviously, this is not relevant to a fourth-grader. They can still, there still makes sense to be prompting. But for high schoolers, one would expect them to be able to say, 'I need a shower. I'm going to go shower,' pretty independently. A lot of the students that I work with, that doesn't happen. There's still the prompting to make that happen. When you're in college, you need to be able to do that because the roommate complaints can be pretty, you know, challenging for students, and they may not know what to do with a roommate complaining about, 'I don't think I smell,' and you know, meanwhile, they haven't showered and they're not... because those prompts weren't there. So those basic hygiene things are important.

If your child is using medication, it's important to... you know, taking medication for ADHD or whatever it is that they need, to be able to understand why they're taking it, to have a plan to build their skills of remembering to take it. A lot of parents, it's on their... it's they have breakfast, their juice, their breakfast, and then their their morning medication is right there. And again, depending on the age or your unique situation, that could be fine. But if we're about to send them off to college and there's no plan for that transition, that's important as well. And so those are...

(Callie) "Marcy, yeah, this is Callie. You're making me think, too, about refills. Like, how do you teach your child to get refills of medication? Where do they go? When do they..."

(Marcy) "It's a very important question. It's something to discuss with the prescribing physician if it's a psychiatrist or the... because some, depending on where the student will go off to school, some will just come home and just kind of keep their regular routine. But if the student is going farther away, then there's typically a discussion about transfer of care to to the college, and it's being followed there. But regardless, the student is going to need to know how to refill their medication and when to do it. Of course, there's that like, 'Oh, but I finished my last pill yesterday, so I'm going to call tomorrow.' Depending on the medication, that may not be awesome. And so a lot of that will need to be practiced before the student goes.

Other things that are really important around independent living skills, one of the biggest things that I get that gets discussed in my office is the internet use. Many families—so if this is you, you're in really good company—many of the families they just turn off the internet in the household at a certain time, so there are no arguments because nobody's using anything and it's managed by the family, and the student gets a good night's sleep and everything is fine because there is no access, and they don't take phones away or any of that. So that is something when I ask a family, 'Is the student able to independently manage their internet and go to bed at a reasonable...' because that's usually, those things go together: 'Students not managing their internet, they go to bed really late, they oversleep, they miss class.' Like, that's the fear. And then the families might say, 'Yes, we can... you know, internet is managed independently.' And then you dig deeper, kind of like with the shower, and you learn it's managed independently because they're turning it off because... so it feels independent to the student, right? Wouldn't it? Because they're doing it because they're not on it, but somebody else turned it off. And that kind of thing is really important to be mindful of.

And again, it really depends on the age of your student. If you're a middle schooler, that's fine. Like, we're in tricky times, you know, I understand. But if you have a student who's ending high school and is not really aware of the importance of managing their internet and it's a difficult thing, then that's something to have a conversation about because nobody is turning off the internet in college. There's one school that I have visited recently where they, I think this is the best idea, they made the internet slower in the student's room and they made it faster in the common areas to encourage social contact so students wouldn't isolate themselves in their bedrooms playing games. It's much better to play the games because it needs faster internet in the common areas, and that was very interesting. But yeah, there's internet everywhere.

So this is a question I'll ask families, 'Would this student be okay if their parents were out of town for a weekend or a week?' And I'll gauge the amount of time based on the family, and you know, you get all kinds of answers, and it's a good question for all of us to ask, you know, what would happen? Would the dog get watched? Would the fish survive? When would anybody eat? Would showering happen? You can always play around with it and say, 'So what if mom and dad left town but they left a big load of laundry and asked you to fold it? What do you think the chances are that the laundry would be folded before they got home?' And like, usually, families they kind of look at each other and laugh and be like, 'Yeah, well, maybe it would get folded.' And that's all fine, but it's just asking those kinds of questions and imagining, 'If you left your child alone, what would happen and what wouldn't happen?' And that's a good indicator to help you as a parent know what you should work on next because you're not going to get all of this stuff done at once, but it helps you to kind of prioritize and what's important to you and what skills do you want your child to learn.

The other thing I'll do for high schoolers who are later on in high school, 11th or 12th grade, where we're really not sure about the student's ability to go off right away and head into college, first-semester freshman year in dorm living, is asking the parent to write down, keep track of just for a day or two, the amount of times, all of the times that they prompt their child. 'Honey, it's time for dinner.' 'How many times do you have to do that?' 'You got to get your homework.' 'We got to do this.' 'We got to do that.' 'I told you we need to.' And how many times, which of the things, which are the times of day, and how many times do you need to prompt? And then that is really helpful. You shouldn't tell your student you're doing it, but you just do it for a day even, and you look at that and you're going to get a sense of, 'Okay, we have, there are some areas, I see on prompting a lot.' And then, you know, trying to work with a therapist or yourselves figuring out strategies that you can build so that your student can be more independent and less dependent on you to prompt. So that's independent living skills. There's a lot to say about that, isn't there?

Self-Determination

"Okay, so I want to say a word or two about self-determination because this is a concept that incorporates a lot, actually all of the things that I was just talking about, but I think it's worth describing a little bit in more detail because it's one of those intangible things that you see in some students when... and when you... I'll have a conversation with a student and like in my heart I'm feeling this... this child is ready for college. What are some of the things that a student might say or that how the conversation might go that makes me feel like that? And so usually, I'll ask the students to tell me some of the challenges that you have with school and what are your some of your strengths. And the student is able to say, 'I struggle with math, I have a math tutor for that. I'm in this other math class, but I'm really good at English and I do these other things.' So that's a student who can tell me their strengths and challenges. They can tell me the help that they're getting. That's some self-awareness.

And then I can ask some questions about self-advocacy. 'So if you were having trouble with your math and your math tutor didn't come, what would you do?' And they can kind of answer that. And that there's a confidence in them. Like, 'Of course, my tutor didn't come. I needed my other tutor. Why wouldn't I need a tutor? Of course I knew that.' Like, there's... 'I know the student is expressing this idea that I know that I need these supports to be successful, and I know I'm going to be successful, and so I'm going to go get these supports because why wouldn't I? Why wouldn't I have this tutor?' Like, there's this energy in the conversation that there's an independence. They're not looking at their mom and saying, 'Well, what would I do?' because they don't need to. It wouldn't occur to them because they know, 'I'm going to college. I'm going to be successful, and this is why.' And there's there's something in the way a student is able to talk about these kinds of issues: their self-advocacy, their ability to function independently, manage things, make an adjustment. 'If something didn't work one way, well, what do you do?' 'Well, I would go here, I would ask for help, I would do this.' Like, they would make an adjustment. And all of that gives a feeling to me that this student has enough resources and enough determination and like, inner sense of focus of where they want to go and what they want to do that their disability at that point really doesn't matter because they know how to get the help, they know what help that works for them, what help doesn't work for them. And as long as that help is in front of them and that they can access it, those students, I don't... I don't think twice about because they have that self-determination. And if they needed something, I know they'll email me and say, 'I'm having trouble with this. Can you help me figure out how to get that?' And we're all going to be great. And that's kind of what the goal is with college readiness is is having that sense of self-determination. And it's the kind of thing we're developing all the time, right? Like, I don't expect a high school senior, freshman in college, who have perfect self-determination, but you can kind of see the evolution in students of their integrating their strengths and challenges, being able to ask for help, and their awareness—all of that that kind of creates this sense.

Disclosing a Diagnosis on a College Application

"So, these are some questions that were asked, and then we'll go into some others, I think Callie will help us with those. So, what are important things to know about disclosing a diagnosis on a college application?

Your student does not need to disclose a diagnosis. There's no... nobody's going to ask you for it. You have no... you don't have to tell anybody. The disability office is not connected to the admissions office. The only way a student would share that is because they wanted to, and they wanted to write an essay about it or something like that, and that's how they will know about it. And I will tell you, I would say about 80% of my students want to actively insist about writing about their disability. And my job is to help craft that essay so that it shows a trajectory of understanding their challenge, what did they do about it, and how did they grow from it so that the college people are really getting a sense of, it's not just about, 'Oh, look, I have these challenges,' but, 'This is who I am within, even though I have these challenges. Look at the person that I am.' As long as that comes through, that's fine. And I have not seen students... I've not gotten the feeling from a student's application process when you see where they get accepted to and don't get accepted to, that there was ever any student that I was like, 'Wow, that student should have gotten in there, but I don't think they got in because they shared the diagnosis.' Like, that has... it's actually been the opposite. And I've had to... I've read a couple of essays that I was like, 'Whoa, I'm really worried. Like, you are sharing like a lot.' And I emailed the parents, 'I'm like, wow, you know, you guys better... it's not my essay, it's not my choice, I can only advise it.' I'm like, 'This is a lot of sharing that not necessarily you need to go through.' And they're like, 'No, we're doing it,' and the student got in. Like, it did not... so even I was wanting to pull back and it didn't have an impact. So as long as you do it well, it doesn't... it doesn't impact. And actually, it's not allowed to impact. Like, they can't say, 'Uh, this student was otherwise acceptable, but because they have ADHD or whatever, we chose not to accept the student.' They can't do that.

What are some examples of students I've worked with the application process? Do you want me to go through that, Callie, or were there other questions do you think I should hit first?

(Callie) "I think if you could just give a couple of examples, that would be great."

(Marcy) "Okay. Okay, so let's talk. So again, I'm changing names and I'm going to do a compilation, but we'll call this first one Andy because my brother's name is Andy and his birthday's tomorrow, so we'll call him Andy. Student Andy. Okay, so I had known Andy for, I don't know, like seven years. I've known him off and on. I ran a camp, you know, well, just through different circumstances. And he was a late-diagnosis student. So, very bright. It's one of those students where because of the high IQ and the high capacity for doing schoolwork, he didn't really need to study. Why would he? He listened to the material, he regurgitated it right back. He, you know, didn't need to build study skills. And had good grades, and really wanted to be in computer science. And this was a great place to live. You know, Dad was a computer scientist, and he had that kind of... that was his world.

But then, when it came to college and we're sitting there, and this is a kid who can really go far—he tests well, school comes easy. 'Let's take some community college classes,' I've decided with them, 'just to kind of challenge you and see how you do. And let's get you in a learning environment that's a little bit different to make sure that you're going to be able to handle that setting.' And so that was a very interesting process because all of a sudden, in a different setting, there were different expectations. The studying is different. The expectation is, 'You're just supposed to sit in class.' There's not a lot of class discussion where this student took his community college class. A lot of information was coming at him. It was hard for him to take it all in. He didn't feel like he needed to read the book because he never really had to, because in high school, he was able to just absorb the material in the way it was presented to him. And now it's being presented differently, and he really had no study skills. Like, why would he? He's never studied for a test before, never had to.

And so that's a typical situation that I see with students is that they're so bright that they don't have those basic skills of sitting down and taking notes, close reading, all of that stuff. It doesn't come naturally to them. But now we have a situation where this is like, you know, 11th, 12th grader, and they've got it in their head that they've got this. They've got academics. They struggle in other areas, they might accept the fact that they have these other challenges, but academics they've got dialed in. And they're not happy confronting the fact that academics actually may be a problem in this one way, that they might have something to learn. And that conversation is tricky. And helping a student to be open enough to realize that in their area of strength that they need some additional support. And that kind of a situation is pretty common that I see in my work because I work with students who have... they're very bright but they have these other challenges. And that takes a team.

So, depending on how open the student is to making some changes, you saw in my self-determination slide like there was the adjustment section and the self-evaluation. That is hard to come by even for adults. And so when we are asking the student to say, 'Hey, the way you saw yourself as, you know, 10 out of 10 in academics and now you're in a different setting and you're not, how can you adjust to that?' We all need to make changes, but when you struggle in other areas, that's hard. It's really hard to do. And that's why we want to make sure that we're letting our students know that this is expected. Like, the fact that you are struggling like this, why wouldn't you? There's no way that all of you have all of the skills that you're going to need academically by the time you're 16 or 17. Like, that's just not the way it rolls. But it's a hard thing for some students to adjust to. So, that particular student, yeah.

(Callie) "So, how do you help a student adjust to that? How do you walk them through that?"

(Marcy) "Well, with Andy, we... you know, he... I had to have a separate meeting with the parents. And Andy knew that I was doing that and kind of talked about this and I talked about it with him as well about the importance of being open to learning new ways of learning and and seeing things through a little bit of a different angle. And we really talked about a therapist that was more like, not so much a therapist like, 'Tell me how you're feeling,' but more of a therapist coach. So, sometimes they're like a little bit of a hybrid: an executive functioning coach and therapist to really have some concrete work going on but then also, 'So, why are you struggling with that? How can we change this up so you can be more open to that?' And looking at the disability office and what kinds of supports are there. And they'll walk the... some of the executive functioning coaches that I work with, they will walk the student to the disability office at the community college. They'll go through it with them about the supports that are available. So, the therapist slash and or executive functioning coach really helps working with the parents and really breaking down the college readiness thinking that the student needs to incorporate and then bringing that into the home.

Sometimes it's about increasing dialogue about strengths and challenges. Parents maybe need to be more open about the things that they struggle with so that the student can feel like, 'This is not just about me.' 'I never realized that my mom is terrible and she's a terrible cook and who really knew and Dad has been covering for her terrible, you know, the fact that she's a terrible cook.' And help the students see people in a more three-dimensional way, because we all need help with things. But students, some students depending on their challenges, may have trouble seeing the different elements of the people around them and pointing that out. And then sometimes working together, if the parent says, 'You know, I need to build this skill, you need to go. Let's work on it together. You help me, I'll help you.' So, kind of coming beside the student and building the skill as opposed to saying, 'Listen, if you want to go off to college, Marcy says you need to have this skill so we need to get... let's get...' That's not... that's like not coming beside. It's the opposite. So, for many of the students that I work with, it's figuring out where they're at, what they're going to be able to be okay with, and then coming beside them and slowly moving them in that direction.

(Callie) "You know, I love that. I love that concept of coming beside the students and helping... helping move with them. I think that's important to remember that even as our kids are becoming young adults, that they're not adults. They're still teenagers. They still need us there beside them. Sometimes they don't want it, but yeah.

Related to this example, we got a question from Helen who wanted to know, in this example specifically, is a student able to get into a four-year program and then defer and take one or more community college classes? Like, is that sometimes how you help families gauge if their child is really ready or not?"

(Marcy) "So, in the student Andy, he took a community college class while still in high school. So, he took that over the summer. And that's a good way to kind of play around with practicing these skills. But with some students, they will take a gap year and build those skills if... if looking at going right into a four-year college may be too much for them. But it's my feeling that we want to practice these skills as much as possible while they're at home and just pushing them a little bit. And so seeing how far we can push the students because one of the things that I want to avoid with students is those secondary diagnoses that can happen of anxiety, of depression when they're off in college because they got pushed too far. It was too tricky, and they didn't have those their typical supports and they didn't have the ability to create these new supports because they didn't realize how hard it was going to be. And then you see students, they can get depressed, they can get anxious, they stop going to class and they feel worse. And we want to really, like, that is... that scenario is what I want to throw my body in front of. Like, I do not want... if there's anything I could do to prevent that, that's what I would do. And that's why I like to play around with the opportunities in high school so that we know, 'Oh, yeah, this class in community college of the summer was too hard. He got really anxious.' And I'm thinking, 'I'm so glad we figured that out now and we could do something about it.' And then, so I'm kind of relieved, actually, because then when we can get the help as opposed to not having found that out and waiting. Does that answer your question?"

(Callie) "I don't know. I think that's a great answer. I think there's some good ideas there for how we can use the last few years of high school to play around, right? And figure things out, not wait until it's too late. So, Marcy, I want to thank you for taking the time to put together this thoughtful and informative presentation. And you did address many of the questions that people pre-submitted. We did have a few additional questions, and I have one also coming in, a couple coming in from the audience. So just as a reminder to everyone, we'll get to as many of your questions as we can. Hopefully, we'll be able to get to all of them, but we are going to keep an eye on the time. And we will work with Marcy to send a follow-up email to any questions we may not be able to get to tonight. So, you've gone through a lot of great information about how to think about what different colleges offer. Are there any really good resources that you would recommend to find listings or the information about colleges that support the different learning needs? So you kind of went through comprehensive and compliance and moderate. Like, how would you actually find a listing to understand what those options are other than you of course, which we know you are a great resource."

(Marcy) "So, I know that people use... there's... it's called the K&W Guide, like the letter K.

(Callie) "Can you say that again?"

(Marcy) "It's the letter I can send it to you, but it's the K like letter K and W, the letter W. It's a book that covers a lot, like, colleges and the disability supports that they have. Honestly, I actually don't own that. I know that that's the book that people will suggest. But I'll tell you why. You know, so if you if you just went right now and googled 'best colleges for students with disabilities,' you're going to get a range, and it's a good place to start. But what you'll find out is that they each have their own little area of specialty. And the main thing to look at first is to know what the student needs. So for example, I was just at American University. They have a great program for students with dyslexia, those reading and writing challenges. They... it's comprehensive. They... you actually have to... you have to get accepted to American. That's true for all the schools. And then you have to get accepted as a student, but then you have to fill out a separate application, and then they interview you, and they... they don't take everybody. Like, they're going to... they're going to make sure that you are a fit for what they offer. And so maybe they take, I don't know, a half, three-quarters of the people, but not everybody with dyslexia is getting in there. And then they just... then it's very specific, and that program is for you.

So, if you were that kid that went across the country, you happen to have this challenge that, you know, fits in this mold, then that's an awesome program. But that's going to be listed. But part of your Googling of colleges with great support programs that could be on there. And so if you have a student that really needs more eyes on them, needs more of a... I was describing earlier that there's that giant resource room one. Like, that's a totally... American isn't like that, but it would still be listed under your comprehensive. So as tempting as it is to look for a list, my suggestion is that you start with the major that your student is interested in, like, bigger schools and smaller schools, the type of learning environment. There are so many different things around an educational environment. There's different seminar styles where there's a lot of discussion or there's very hands-on programs. There's colleges that have an upside-down model where the first two years are more like your typical junior-senior year where you're like doing and experiencing and then your last two years are more the foundational fundamentals of it. And so a bunch of my students love that because they're ready to dive right into the hands-on learning, and so an upside-down model is the best thing for them.

So if you take a student like that and then you find this great school with an upside-down model and it has their major and then we... and we're like, 'Wow, that's a great fit for the student,' and then we start to look at the challenges. 'What does the student need to be successful there?' 'Well, he needs extended time on tests.' 'Well, you're going to get that anywhere.' 'Okay, what else does he need?' 'Well, he needs an executive functioning tutor five days a week.' 'Okay, what's available in the community? Let's contact the disability office. Who did they refer to for executive functioning?' And all of a sudden, you've put together an amazing college experience for this student. And so it's not as straightforward as, 'Where's the list?' It's more complex. And then you add other variables, I haven't even mentioned like the finances or the weather. I mean, the weather is such a big issue for many of the students I work with. Some are like, 'I hate cold. I will not be anywhere near cold.' And I'm like looking in Florida. And then others are like, 'Oh my god, I hate the heat. The heat's terrible. I will melt. I can't go anywhere near the heat.' And those are deal-breakers for students. So if I look at the K&W Guide, I'm like, 'Yes, this is the best school for my kid,' but it's in Florida, and they like... I was a waste of my time. So I kind of go in the other direction and see what I can work out with with accommodations.

There are some schools that are just not going to work out. I mean, with some students, like you can fall in love with Columbia University. 'I love the major. I have to have this one.' 'That's so I want Columbia.' 'Like, this is the school for me.' 'It has these things, it's the perfect weather for me.' But then, academically, or like the... that's a competitive school. There's a competitive edge there. It's not warm and cooperative. It's a great school but not for everybody. And then, 'Oh, like that you got to take that off the list.' Like, that, you know, that's a recipe for disaster because one variable threw five good variables off. So it's like a bit of a puzzle that you have to spend looking at who the student is and what the pieces are as opposed to a list.

(Callie) "Right, right. I like that idea, too, that you could find the school that has just what they want to learn and if they don't have all the supports at the school, how you can work in the community to make it work for your child. Too, is that... that's a great creative angle. So a lot of people, we have, you know, when we surveyed the attendees, we have everyone from elementary through high school. In fact, the attendees were about split between elementary and high school, middle or high school. And so one person had asked, you know, some people who have elementary school students when they're thinking long-term about what's best for their children, they want to know how important it is to think through their middle and high school selection. So one of the questions was, how helpful do you think a specialized school such as a school that's focused on dyslexia would be compared to a public school, or is there any value in staying in the public school system and having an IEP versus going to a more specialized school for elementary, for middle, and high school?"

(Marcy) "So my feeling is just in general, obviously, I don't know the specific families, but my feeling in general is to meet the student's needs at the moment because the self-esteem of the student, are they able to make friends, are they able to learn because the educational environment is meeting their needs? Are they in an environment where they can understand what it means to be a student and be a successful student as independently as possible? And if that is the case, it does... you know, that it doesn't matter the school. Like, there's a lot of specialized schools around here and kids get into colleges, like some of them, like, I'm like, 'Oh, wow, I'm thinking, wow, that's a pretty high-profile school and look at the school.' Like, I know you're at this very tiny specialized school. When students apply to college, this school sends a school report and it tells everything about that school. It tells the classes that are offered, it tells or they don't offer AP, it tells about free lunches, so like the socioeconomic... like, it tells so whoever's reading this transcript and looking at the student application, they have a context for where this student was educated. So those colleges know where the student is coming from. And it is amazing, students get into college. Like, I have not seen, 'Wow, you are a great candidate but I don't think you got in because you came from this specialized place.' That has not happened. So, I think that it's the opposite effect. Sometimes they're like, 'Wow, look at this student. He came when he was getting all this... what's... look at him. He's thriving. He's got this, he's got that.'

But don't... so don't go to a specialized school because I just said that. Like, go with where the student, where is going to be able to build all of these independent living skills, social skills, academic confidence that... but in the moment. And if you need to make a change, then to go up or down or this way or that way, then that's fine. But I would not necessarily make a decision about today thinking about college. College will be there. It's building that foundation for the child because that's what will really set them up to thrive in the long run.

(Callie) "Right. And remember when I said about that self-determination slide? Like, you had... you know, was a student getting a lot of their needs met and learning how to be a student and advocate and feel good about themselves? He's going to be one of those students I'm going to sit in front of and be like, 'You've got this,' like, and you're going to... 'You'll figure this out because I see that you have that ability.' And so that's really... and then I'll ask that same kid, like, 'Okay, so do you have prompting to shower?' Like, 'If your parents left you,' they'd be like, 'No, my parents leave me all the time.' Like, that's what we want. And that's the kid we want to send off to college and and we'll feel good about it. And that is nothing to do with grades. Grades are going to come, but that other piece... like, what I... I don't see students that have high self-determination and but more academic challenges, they do fine. They find their academic spot and they figure it out. The people who struggle are the high academic but low independent living skills, and they think that they're fine, and then they go off and they realize that they're fine and they don't have the tools to deal with it. That's the struggle.

(Callie) "Well, this is... other question we got in our pre-submitted questions was very specific. They... you know, some of our twice-exceptional kids really struggle with the foreign language requirements both that you need to graduate from high school and that many colleges expect. So what are the options for college if you don't want to take a foreign language in high school?"

(Marcy) "So a lot of it is going to depend on the documentation of the disability that's making language... I put like a second language tricky. So if it's, 'I feel like the second language stresses my child out,' but there's no documentation around that, that's going to be a challenge. But if there's... but there is if there is a disability, then in high school, it's working it out with the high school about any modifications that they need to make around their... their high school graduation requirements. But that usually is fine. But then there are next two questions, are what do the colleges expect regarding a second language for acceptance into that college? But then you have the other issue of you have to graduate. You have to graduate from that college and do they have a language requirement to graduate from college? And so those are school-by-school questions. And so that happens a decent amount in my world. And so I'll call a couple of the colleges for the family and just get some information. And then I'll put the student on that as well to make some of those phone calls. But basically, you're teaching by modeling for the student, 'Okay, this is my disability. I, you know, I'm can... if I don't have, I only have one year of a foreign language, but I meet all the other requirements and I... I have this disability, can I still apply? Will you still look at my application?' Typically, it's 'yes.' There's some schools that are just going to say 'no,' but many times it's 'yes.' And then the follow-up question is asking about the graduation requirements. Do they waive that? And usually, colleges will say, 'We need you to take... we'll waive the foreign language requirement, but you need to instead take a culture class.' So they might have to take two semesters of whatever culture and then that... then everybody is happy. But those are very individual questions to ask the colleges.

(Callie) "Great. So this is the big question. I'm sure it's on everyone's mind, which is how do we think about all of this now with the coronavirus situation and how are colleges going to handle all of this?"

(Marcy) "So they're... they're figuring out as they go right now. So they're modifying. So if you... if there's any current juniors about to be rising seniors, they might have heard that there's many of the colleges are waiving they need to take the SAT or the ACT. Not all of them, but certainly the UCs and the CSUs and a lot of schools like that. And so what that means is that if you've taken it already and you can take it, then you can submit it if you want, but they're not going to just... they're not going to disqualify you if you didn't take it. So the whole landscape is changing because now a question that we don't know: 'How are how are the UCs going to be looking at an applicant differently if they don't submit a score?' So they... I don't even think the UCs know that yet. And it's going to be a bit of a tricky time coming up, but they're going to figure it out. So this coming up year, it's going to be interesting. But going forward after that, some schools might remain test optional, but I'm sure many of the others are going to go back to the way that they were. And be mindful of the fact that test optional means that you don't have to send it in, but they'll still look at it. There's other schools that, some schools that are test blind, that if you could send it in, they're not looking at it. But so we're not talking about that. So if your student tests well and they want to send it in, you can figure out how to get a test and then if you don't have one already and get that in. So that's one piece of the change.

The other is, you know, is it safe to go off to college? What should we... you know, how far away should we go? So there's... colleges are being very flexible for the most part. I was reading about one college in particular that just sent a letter out to students from the president, basically saying, 'We're planning on being live, like on campus, if we're not in in the fall. And if we're not, we will charge less for online. If you want to defer for a year, that's going to be fine with us. If you want to withdraw, we'll give you your money back.' Like, they understand and they're like, 'This is... we get it, and we're going to work with you.' 'If you want to come, come.' And so they're trying their best. Some schools are going to be more rigid because financially they can't do that. But it's going to be a tricky time for many people, but it's going to it's going to play itself out. But either maybe they're going to have their first semester online and then they'll show up in campus second semester. But it's going to be different. It is sad that probably going to be, I mean, you know, when I was in college, walking around with people with masks on, it would never occur to me, and that's probably what's going to be happening. And probably, you can't hang around the dining hall with masses of people and sporting events. Probably take out food that you go and you eat in your dorm because, you know, limiting connecting. But so nobody really knows what it's going to be like. But as far as, you know, figuring out from your end of just continue, I think just to press on and people will guide you. Does that answer that?"

(Callie) "Well, and I think it gets back to a lot of your just readiness skills and your, you know, your self-regulation, your advocacy, your ability. You know, these are going to be changing times, and preparing our children as best we can to take care of themselves and regulate and be mindful and ride the wave, which is important. Important skill at any time, but they're even more important probably for the foreseeable future. Yeah.

So, a lot of great questions are coming in. We're going to shift to those. If you all would please use the Q&A rather than the chat just so I don't miss your question. I can see there are some questions in the chat and I am really hoping to get to them, but it's easier for me to track them in the Q&A. So, Allison and Nancy, I see your questions so you don't have to retype them. But just a reminder for everyone else, if you could use the Q&A, that'd be awesome. So, one of the questions that came in on the Q&A was whether community colleges support students better than four-year colleges and whether we should use a community college path to work on those independent skills and then transfer to a four-year college. It sounded before like you were saying you like to experiment with that some when the kids are in high school, but that may not be possible for everyone. So, just curious if you think this is a feasible or an advisable path."

(Marcy) "So, it is very student specific. Like everything is. But I'll kind of go through some of the areas to think about. So, first of all, the community college option is an awesome one. When you go for two years, you can have... they have these tag programs where there's guaranteed admission to some, but not all of the UCs or other schools or CSUs. And, you know, the price of paying two years of community college and then transferring to UC Santa Cruz, and then you graduate from UC Santa Cruz and nobody will ever know that you just did two years there, but you did it for half the cost, and you got that extra time to prepare and be ready for college is an awesome option for some students. So, there's... having said that, some of the downsides that I see with it, and again, it's based on the student, is that I have seen many of the students that I work with when they're working on some of those independent living skills where there's a lot of prompting that you end up having the two years of community college being two years of like extended high school because the student still comes home, they have dinner, the mom's like, 'You got to get dinner,' and I can... and there's still like it's hard to step up into independence when you're still at home. And it's, I mean, I don't know, like, even when I was like in my 30s and I would come home to my parents, my mom, my feet are up, and I'm not like if there's something about it that you just, you know, like you just kind of, 'My mom will do that.' Like, that's... that's... that's the relationship. And but meanwhile, I'm out there, I, you know, my whole life, and I'm totally independent. So, for... I get why that's a struggle. So if it's a student that's really struggling with stepping up in their independence or a parent is having trouble pulling back, then then that in and of itself is tricky.

The other part of community college that's hard is it's... there's not much of a community. There's various ages there. There's not that campus social life. There are clubs, but it's not the same as when you're living in a dorm and you're all just kind of eating in the cafeteria for you, seeing each other at breakfast. Like, it's just a different energy. And if the student is really looking to make friends, that that's harder because they're just... they go to school and then they come home. And but for some students, it could be fine. But other students, it's not. If they're... they don't make the progress with the independent living skills and then that becomes more of a struggle. There are programs that you can go to where you, your student is in community college, they don't have to deal with the intensity of a four-year college, but they are living somewhere else where there's others that are working on their independent living skills. And that's kind of a good middle ground depending on the student. Does that answer that?"

(Callie) "Great. Definitely. It made me think of that TV show, Community. So, Ari, someone else asked, 'Are you familiar with the CIP program for building independent skills? And if you are, what do you think about that program?'"

(Marcy) "I am familiar with it. They're in line with others. So there's College Internship Program is the CIP. There's also the CLE, the College Living Experience. They're... these are all over the country. Like, they're... yeah, they're pretty much all over the country. I was actually just at one in Maryland. So, yeah, they are... they're definitely some advantages to them. They have people, they're working on their independent living skills. They could be taking classes. They could... they have tutors that are associated with them. And I think that they're worth a visit if you're... if you're looking for that. One of the issues that I have with it is that the students are living in apartments, like full-on apartments that I was not living in until much later. And these are also adults, now we're talking about, so we're talking about 18 year or above who are living in their own apartment and they're part of this program. So, for some students, it's awesome. For other students, they recognize that they can say, 'No, thank you,' when the tutor comes by or when the independent living skills person comes by and said, 'We're going to go doing some food shopping,' or 'Want to come join this group?' And so they have all this great stuff, but if it's not a student who's going to really take advantage of it, the setup is not great because, in my opinion, because it's their apartment. Like, there are not... there are other programs, it's more like a house. And so it's harder to avoid the people that are helping you. But these are apartments, and so for some students, it's awesome, but for other students, it's not. So again, like everything else, that's so student-dependent. I mean, if it works for the student, it's really a great option because they provide so many resources and supports to build those independent living skills. Just make sure it's not someone who says 'no' a lot.

(Callie) "Earlier, it sounded like you might have suggested there are gap-year programs specifically designed to help kids. And maybe these are related, I don't know if these are different or similar. But are there... are there programs like gap-year programs that do help kids who need a little bit of extra help getting ready for college? And can you tell us a little more about those programs? And maybe these are the same thing, but I don't know, maybe there's something different."

(Marcy) "So, there's it's it's a little bit of a language issue because gap so the gap year implies that you're taking a gap, you know, in between high school and college. And so that's one thing of it. But then there's this idea of like a gap year program where you go and you travel and you build houses in South Africa or you do an internship. And they're they're structured year-long programs. So of those, I've had students who, that they graduated from high school, the parents realized, 'We're not ready for college. Let's apply to college, defer a year. Let's go to South... we'll send him to South Africa, he'll build houses, he'll mature, he'll come back, we'll go to college.' The problem with that... that I mean, not that it can't ever work. With the ones that end up in my office where it didn't work, is because there was no skill-building. Like the student... the reason why the student didn't go off to college is that they were getting prompted and they were doing all these things. But then when you do this other thing where you're like around other people and everybody is getting up to go build houses or whatever it is they're doing, and they're not teaching them how to be students. They're not teaching them, you know, these skills about working independently. Because when you're in college, like, nobody else has your schedule. You have to get up when you need to get up. You need to... when you need to eat. And those skills were not built in that particular program that the student spent during their gap year. So I just wanted to make that point of it.

And so when we say gap years, then I guess the idea obviously is you're taking a year, but what's important to me is what are you doing in that year? And what you need to do in that year is should be based on what skills you need to be able to go off to college. And so finding a gap year program that will build those skills. So, some... sometimes that skill is going off to Africa, you know, and building out, you know, things. But most of the students that I work with, it's not that. And there are programs where the students take community college classes, they work on their independent living skills, they work on living without their parents and starting to live that life of a student. But there are eyes on them. There's people guiding them. Everybody there is to learn these... is there to learn these skills. And so they're they make friends and it's so that's to me that's a gap year, but it's a program as opposed to the typical...

(Callie) "And that's not the CIP or CLE. Like, is there... can you say like what are some of those programs or where do you find them?"

(Marcy) "So a CLE or a CIP, I don't know that they build themselves as a gap year. You can use it as a gap year, but I don't think that they actually... I have no idea what they would say because they might want more than one year of your time as a student. So, what is the question? Like, what... what is the... so if it's... if if it's not one of those, then what are what are those programs and how do you find them? Like, if you are looking specifically for that kind of skill-building gap-year experience where you could take classes and work on living skills and there are eyes on you but it's not as much prompting as you might get at home, where do you find those kind of experiences?"

(Marcy) "So, you can email me. I can get you some because, honestly, I know a lot of the folks and they're very different. And so somebody with ADHD with these issues versus autism, they're all like they... they create a community. And so just email me and this is some of my things and, you know, where do you suggest I look and I can just email some resources for it. But, you know, I can be great. I can give you a couple examples if that would be helpful. So, one of them would be, I would say, College Excel which is up in Bend, Oregon. And another one is Mansfield Hall. You can look at those two. There's others, but you have to be mindful of the fact that there are a range of kids out there and there's a range of programs. And so, some don't have any therapists on and you need to go and if you're a student would benefit from the therapist, not that they can't have it, but it's it's outside of the program and they make sure you get there. But then there's other programs that there's therapists there. And so, there's so many... there's a lot of options depending on what would be right for the student. So, those are two to just kind of look at and think about, but families can just email me and learn more.

(Callie) "And Marcy, can you go to the next slide so that people can see your website because that's probably the best way for people to find your email and your phone number if they want to be in touch with you."

(Marcy) "Correct. There it is. Yeah, yeah, that's yeah, email is the best. Yeah.

(Callie) "Okay. So, we have a couple of questions that came in on the chat and the first one is, is there a resource or a place that can help your child or student find out what he's good at? So, like, someone a teacher or a therapist or a program that really can help dig into the areas that interest the child and help them see if college is actually the best place for him or what if it turns out that college isn't the best place, how do you figure out what his options are? Like it can't... like there's got to be something besides college or sitting on the couch. So, how do you know what else is out there besides college?"

(Marcy) "So, do you think there's a lot in that one question. Do you think it's going for more like figuring out like careers and majors and like a resource for that? Does that seem like...?"

(Callie) "I would say like based on even my own personal experience and and in this question is like, 'How do you how do you know what your child is good at? How do you help them understand their strengths and their interests?' Like, is there a way to help a child start to think about themselves in that way and assess themselves in that way? And then as you go through that, what if you decide college isn't the best choice? Then what do you do?"

(Marcy) "Right. So, it depends really, depends on the age of the child. So if we're dealing with somebody younger and you're just trying to help them figure out what are they good at, the answer is really just a lot of different exposure. A lot, you know, some of the things that to think about is that if you're watching a movie with your child and somebody's in the Museum of Natural History, 'Hey, what do you think about dinosaurs? Do you like dinosaurs?' On a scale of one to ten, 'How much?' And you just kind of take notes and, you know, like so you watch movies and you ask questions based on that, based on your knowledge of your child and what do they like and then you can then start to explore that a little bit. Take a class or, you know, just try to dig into it a little bit is just to at least get... they don't have to that doesn't have to be their life's work, but it's nice for us all to figure out what we like to do. Pull out a jigsaw puzzle today. Like that, like in those kinds of things. Reading time and just so the student like all of those examples I was giving, none of them do I think that the student is going to be like a jigsaw puzzle major. But what I'm suggesting is that when students feel like they know what they like, like if I walked up to somebody and said, 'What game do you like to play with your mom the best?' And they said, 'Jigsaws.' Like, there's a sense of pride in that and that's what you want to go for. And then you're like, 'Wow, you must really like jigsaw puzzles.' And and then, 'What else is similar? Oh, if you like jigsaw puzzles, then you must be really good with your, you know, this.' Like, 'I wonder about that.' And like, one thing will lead to the next, but it has to feel organic. And so it's easiest when parents can kind of on those very basic things can help draw out the student to figure out where their areas of interest lie or the athletic. And so that would be I don't know if that really answers that question, but that's for the younger ones.

(Callie) "Yeah. What about more of a high school age child and now you're..."

(Marcy) "Yeah, it's different. Now you're thinking a little more intentionally. Yeah, right. But still building on that hopefully, but there's a program that I use called YouScience which is Y-O-U-S-C-I-E-N-C-E and I use it in my practice, but you can do it on your own. And the student is a test for like it's like all online for like an hour and maybe an hour and a half, but it's a little bit like the Myers-Briggs. And what it does is that it tells the student all the different things like, 'Oh, you're really good at this and that.' Like, just, you know, word finding and things like that. But what I love about it is that it matches the student with careers. So it could show up there and said, 'You'd be a great therapist,' or 'a recreation therapist,' or 'this,' or 'that.' And and then you click on that and it tells you the amount of schooling you need to do that. And then you can kind of see a trend. There are students that really college is not their thing. They hate to be in class. They love to work with their hands. Like, and I think exposing students to apprentice programs and really learning about opportunities and that's all in YouScience. And it'll tell you the day in the life of a plumber and what is it like and what's the training, what should you be good at? And and so that that's a really good resource because when I read through it, some of them and I'll be like, 'I would hate that job,' because they need to stand up all day or they're outside all day and I'd have to wear a hat. I would hate it. And somebody else be like, 'Oh, that sounds great. I don't want to be in indoors, I want to be outside.' So it pulls to the unique. And that could be a good resource.

(Callie) "So in thinking about that, that next step, like other than YouScience, are there other programs that you could look at to know what might be better for your child than college? I think YouScience is a great one, but when you say programs, do you mean like schools, programs, or do you mean like a program like I suggest like at YouScience?"

(Marcy) "I think YouScience is great. I'm wondering if they're like, I'm thinking about is there anything like EvoLibri or anything else like that that can really help kids kind of figure this out if if college is the right thing for them or not, or maybe college is the right thing for them right now? Because you mentioned like apprentice programs and I'm like, 'How do you find out about apprentice programs?' Like, 'How would you even know where to start with that?'"

(Marcy) "But it would pretty much go for what the student wanted. So, is it a student that's very hands-on and then they like to build things? Like I had a student, like his main thing was taking apart computers. He would go through the trash of throwing away computers, put them back together and then and then donate them to people. Like, love love love that. That's a great example of a student who could go totally apprentice work with his hands or go to college and also thrive. Thrive in both ways. And that's like, where do I go? And what do I do? And and then it really depends on the student's interest. Like some students cannot wait to get out of a learning environment that's like structured in class and they don't want to have that, you know, they don't want anything that it involves. So, I guess the only way that I know how to answer that question is a conversation with the student like to figure out like what interests them. And and I find that some students they're just not exposed. Like they don't realize, 'Well, if you go to college, then you could do this.' 'I didn't know I could do that.' And what's really interesting in my work is that when I take it, sit next to a student and I open up a website for a particular college and I'm like, 'Look at that major,' and then they're like, 'Brains are blown.' They're like, 'I did not know.' 'How do you...?' We've got a college-going kid, but I could have done that with an apprentice thing too. Like, but so much has been...

(Callie) "Exposure. Yeah. Well, makes me wish I could go back and do it all over again. Sounds like very exciting. So, one person wanted to know if you could talk a little bit more about clients on the spectrum and how they either adjusted or didn't to going to college far from home because they said this is a big question for them and their current sophomore, like whether they would keep him close to home for college because he's nervous about going far away but there aren't as many choices close by which is true."

(Marcy) "So, what we end up doing because it's a very common scenario in my office, we... so we're going to just only look at schools close by. That's it. And so we'll do that initially. And then while I'm meeting with the family, I'm going to get a sense about why is it so important to stay close by. So we're staying close by but, you know, just really starting to get to know the student a little bit and then whose issue is this, because sometimes it's the parents who really don't want the student to go far away and sometimes it's the student and sometimes it's both. A scenario that often happens is that it turns out there's family members in other states and that will open up a state for me. And then I can offer schools there. But what I find happens is that when I educate students and parents about the different colleges that might be a fit for them in different states, and they start to see the importance of fit and how I can have a school that's closer but it's still like it's just an extra hour, but except you're on a plane here versus that. And then this parent starts to see between 10th grade and 12th grade the huge amount of growth that students go through. And so we always keep those close-to-home schools on the list. Those are always a priority, but then we have these other schools that we're interested in. And then by the time, like right now, May 1st, of figuring out where is that student going to go, we have these options to play with. So, I never push the issue. I mean, sometimes I'll have to say, sometimes I'm so excited about a college for student that's far that I have to tell the family, 'I am so sorry. I am so excited. You just have to accept the fact that I'm excited about this school. But at the same time, I accept the fact that you're going to say no, but I'm still going to show it to you.' And then we can all process this together because there's sometimes there's schools out there that are not close and then it's okay if they don't go. You go with where you're supposed to go on May 1st, is that...

(Callie) "I thought it was... it's very encouraging to hear you say there's huge growth from 10th to 12th grades because I think a lot of us have younger kids and or, you know, kids who we we aren't seeing that light yet that that's going to happen. So when you talk about what they need to be ready to do to go to college, it seems a little intimidating. And just knowing that there's growth on the horizon is hugely encouraging. So we're getting very close to 8:30 and I just want to check in with you, Ellen. See if you had any last questions. I have three questions in the queue still that I think we're not going to get answered tonight. We will follow up with Marcy and get answers to those questions and send those out along with the link to the recording. But yeah, before I close everything up, did you have any last questions or thoughts or comments?"

(Ellen) "Well, I... I think I just personally, you know, of course, we're all the parents on this call probably nervous about their kids. So I would just love to hear when people come to you, I personally have, you know, have kids on the spectrum. I know everyone has different challenges they're working with. Does everyone that comes to you find a fit? Find a place? Find something in the end? Should we be as nervous as we are? Will it work out? And I'd love to hear just a couple, I don't know if you have an example of a, you know, good fit that worked out."

(Marcy) "Yeah. I mean, it does seem to work out. The students find their way, and they end up stepping into where they need to go because when, you know, I'm working with students, particularly students on the spectrum, and I'm going to I'm very honest and I'm saying to them, 'Look, your parents have to write the check for this for the school that you're so excited to go to. And our goal is that they write the check for that school without their hand shaking, that they are confident that this is going to work out.' And so, 'What skills do you, student, need to have in order that your mom doesn't have to write that check with a shaking hand?' And so we start to talk about it, 'We need these skills to happen.' And then that's kind of that self-determination part. Like you kind of start to see, 'My parents have to write a check. I got to get into the school, but I really want to go to the school.' And then they have me saying, 'Well, this is what you need to do to get to that school.' And then that's when the maturity starts. Like the wheels start turning. They're like, 'Okay, I've got this.' And then they start to make those strides. And then usually we're looking at programs with still supports, but it's the degree of supports. And so there's a range and then we see where how much growth they were able to make and where do they fit in with our range of supports that we have and then they go. So it ends up... the setup of it is made so that they're going to be successful when they go because that's just how it's plotted out. But if we didn't do that and we just applied to all UCs and CSUs without great support necessarily and then head out there, then that then that's more of a gamble. But I think that we... the setup is cushioned so that it will involve a successful fit. Does that make sense? It's tricky. It's hard. It's scary. And, you know, I have two seniors and in high school, and so they're... I've just seen the whole, you know, growth and readiness thing and the process and then the fear of the coronavirus and where they're getting on, all of that stuff. And it's, you know, it's still like with my kids I was... I was anxious because I did not know where they should go. Like, I didn't know where their fit was. And what happened was that they ended up figuring it out and they needed to bring me along, be like, 'No, no, you don't understand, this is my school.' And I they had to explain it to me. So they kind of figured it out. And as the parent, we worry, 'Are these... does it have everything?' But then once you take a step back and look at the maturity and where your your child is, chances are they're going to be picking the right fit for them. They're just going to know if they've gotten, you know, all of that information all along, they're going to know where they need to go to to be successful. We have confidence."

(Callie) "That's great. And I I I wish your kids just the best of luck as as they move move on as a fellow twin parent. I know that's a lot to go through in a year. So it is just right after 8:30 and we're going to close tonight by thanking Marcy again for sharing your wisdom and insights with us. And I wish we could hear everybody clapping for you, Marcy. Thank you. Anyone out there, if you yeah, if you'd like to connect directly with Marcy, you can check out her website that's on the screen. And we'd love to see you at any of our future real events that we'll be hosting. And we invite you if you haven't already to join our community. The best way to connect with us is through our website where you can keep up to date on what we're doing and also join our email list. And on our email list, we share resources, advice, and events that are of interest to Silicon Valley parents of twice-exceptional children. So please reach out to us with any ideas or feedback. And I wish you all a good night and many well wishes. Thanks so much."

(Ellen) "No, we're getting a lot of thank you, great programs in our chat. Oh, good, that's nice. Glad to hear that. All right. Take care, everybody. Bye. Thanks. Bye."