Collaborators
Collaborators
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We will conduct focus groups of autistic adolescents, their caregivers, and professionals who perform mental health screening to identify typical barriers and facilitators to completing screening for anxiety and depression.
Our Collaborators include:
Michigan State University Communication Arts and Sciences
Michigan State University Honors Program
Waverly High School
REACH Arts Center
CFC Child and Family Charities
We aim to continue our collaboration with Waverly High School on the Transforming Tools Together Project.
We aim to continue our collaboration with Waverly High School on the Transforming Tools Together Project.
Waverly High School has reported that 40 students identify as autistic in 2024.
Waverly High School Demographics: National Center for Education Statistics (external link)
Waverly High School:
36 Science Students
2 Faculty
MSU Com Art Sci:
32 Game Students
2 Faculty
1 Planetarium Director
Waverly High School and The College of Communication Arts and Sciences of Michigan State University has a history of collaborating lead by Susan Bonner. In the Spring of 2024, Bonner invited Waverly High School to collaborate on Serious Games for the Abrams Planetarium. Together with Dr. Amanda Cote's 20 Graduate students in Foundations of Serious Games and Susan Bonner's 12 students in Serious Game Design, college and 36 high school students created 6 games for the planetarium. These included games connected with Next Generation Science Standards built for the Dome and lobby and take home games that can be played internationally.
Waverly HS: 160 Snow Rd, Lansing, MI 48917
Waverly High School also connected with Com Art Sci for an Ignite the Future Event. Find out more about Ignite the Future at MSU. This program ignites success for first generation and historically marginalized students. Waverly Students toured WKAR, MSU Alienware ESports, GEL Lab (Games and Education Learning Lab) The Media Greenhouse, had a speed networking lunch with faculty and students and celebrated the final Serious Games co-created with MSU students at Abrams Planetarium.
MSU Com Art Sci: 5 faculty 2 Staff 2 Students
Waverly HS: 38 students from Chemistry, Game Design, Engineering and Robotics, 2 Faculty
REACH Studio Art is a vibrant non-profit community art center offering creative out-of-school engagement in the arts for all ages and abilities. Their mission is to Foster equitable access to the arts through educational opportunities and creative engagement. A campus of seven studios located in the REO Town district of Lansing, Michigan will be the space to engage our autistic adolescent participants. We will use the REACH theater space, computer lab and brainstorming space to prototype and co-create the mental health tools.
The Michigan State University Honors Program has funded an Honors Seminar. There are 17 students enrolled for Fall 2024 - Spring 2025.
As a part of a long-term goal to narrow mental health disparities that disadvantage autistic adolescents by designing more accessible mental health screening tools Honors Students will collaborate with faculty and community. During the seminar, students would learn about how to integrate design and research to develop interventions that are a critical step toward mental health equity. Specifically, students would further develop functional prototypes of mental health screening tools, assist with data analysis, and write reports. Students will participate in ideation workshop with autistic youth, professionals who administer the tool, and caregivers/guardians of autistic youth. The funds from the Honors College will support supplies, and participant rewards.
Child and Family Charities
4287 Five Oaks Dr. Lansing, MI 48911
Child and Family Charities (CFC) mission is to strengthen and support children, families, and individuals as they evolve and grow in a changing community. Their vision is to be a leader in human services, recognized for excellence in practice, collaboration, and advocacy on behalf of vulnerable populations. They offer Trauma Focused Mental Health Services for the community. Therapists at CFC will identify eligible autistic adolescents among current clients, as they have an established trusted relationship, and share QR codes to complete online consent/assent forms with the clients and guardians. The guardians will also be recruited to participate in caregiver focus groups. We will employ snowball sampling by asking the autistic adolescents and guardians to identify other potential caregivers. Clinical and social services professionals will be contacted via CFC’s email lists and provided with an email link to the consent form.
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