#154 - Exploring College Fit - and Acceptance: A Conversation with Dr. Eric Endlich Artwork

College Parent Central Podcast

You don’t stop parenting the day you drop your student off to college on Move-in Day. Your role simply changes. (Actually, it’s not simple at all, but it changes.) You’re a parent for life. Join Lynn Abrahams and Vicki Nelson, higher education professionals and former college parents, as they explore the topics that can help you be a more effective and supportive parent to your college bound student. Whether you already have a child in college, college is still a year or more away, or your student is about to step out, start now to gather the information that empowers you to be an effective college success coach to your student.

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College Parent Central Podcast

#154 - Exploring College Fit - and Acceptance: A Conversation with Dr. Eric Endlich

April 15, 2026 • Vicki Nelson, Lynn Abrahams, Elizabeth Hamblet • Season 7 • Episode 154

0:00 | 49:26

In this episode, Vicki and Lynn sit down with Dr. Eric Endlich—clinical psychologist, author, and founder of Top College Consultants—to map a smarter path to college for neurodivergent and disabled students – and really, for everyone else, too. From decoding what colleges are legally required to provide to spotting truly comprehensive support programs, we break down how to verify services, assess campus culture, and avoid costly surprises. Dr. Endlich shares practical strategies to evaluate learning support, autism programs, executive function coaching, and peer mentoring, and why the “feel” of a campus—belonging, friendship, acceptance—matters as much as majors and location.

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SPEAKER_01 0:09

Welcome to the College Parent Central Podcast. Whether your child is just beginning the college admission process or is already in college, this podcast is for you. You'll find food for thought and information about college and about navigating that delicate balance of guidance, involvement, and knowing when to get out of the way. Join your hosts, Vicki Nelson and Lynn Abrahams, as they share support and a celebration of the amazing experience of having a child in college.

SPEAKER_00 0:47

Welcome to the College Parent Central Podcast. This is the place where we talk about all things connected to parenting our kids, our students, as they go to college, as they apply, as they get in, and as they get out. My name is Lynn Abrahams, and I am a learning disability specialist. I've been working with college students for many, many years and their families. But I'm also a parent, a mom of two sons who have all gone through college and around college and in and out. And I'm allowed to tell the story. Yes, most of the time when you're here, I'm here.

Introducing Dr. Eric Endlich

SPEAKER_03 1:43

When I'm here, you're here. So uh no surprise. I'm Vicki Nelson. I am a college professor of communication at a small liberal arts college. I've also served a few years as a director of academic advising. And so I see students every day. I see what works, I see what doesn't work. Um I learn from them and hopefully they learn from me. Um but the like Lynn, my second qualification is I have three daughters. Lynn has the boys and I have the girls, uh, who have all gone on to college and who are all out of college and have moved on. So um I learned by fire, uh, even though I teach in a college, it was very different when I was a parent. So we bring we both bring both perspectives to that. And we are here with a very special guest, and I'm going to let Lynn introduce him.

SPEAKER_00 2:38

So our special guest is Dr. Eric Enlik, and he is a clinical psychologist, a writer, presenter, researcher, who's the founder of Top College Consultants, an organization dedicated to helping students worldwide successfully apply to college and transition to college and graduate school. In 2021, Exceptional Needs Today magazine honored Dr. Endlick as a top contributor for his article, Seven Things Students with Disabilities Should Do When Starting College. He's a co-author of the 2021 book, Older Autistic Adults, in their own words, The Lost Generation. Dr. Enlik has served as a primary researcher and co-investigator in several projects from the U.S. Department of Education, National Science Foundation, Institute of Education. And he's also taught at Tufts University, Suffolk University, Boston College, and UMass Boston. And I've been told by others in the field he's the best in the field. So welcome. Welcome, Eric. We're thrilled to have you.

SPEAKER_02 3:54

Thanks, Lynn. It's great to be here with you and Vicki.

SPEAKER_00 3:58

So we're going to start out with just asking, you know, we like to start by asking people how they came into this line of work. Um, you know, so tell us a little bit about your personal story and how you got here.

Why Students Struggle And A Better Way

SPEAKER_02 4:11

Sure. It's a combination of the personal and the professional. As you said, I'm a clinical psychologist. I worked in mental health settings for many years, um, which is very fulfilling. And I started seeing, I always loved working with teens, but I saw some who went off to college and did not thrive there and did not stay in. And I thought, you know, there's got to be a better way. There's got to be a way to ensure that if and when they they decide to go to college, they're they're going to be successful. I think of it as kind of like that uh saying they they say with um, you know, woodworking, measure twice, cut once. If you can't kind of get it right the first time, maybe you'll stay in and not have to come back with your tail between your legs and feel like a failure. You know, it's it's expensive financially and yeah um and emotionally. So, you know, that that was a piece of it. Um my own two adult children are neurodivergent. Uh, I discovered years into the process that I'm neurodivergent too. And so when I discovered educational consulting and realized I could sort of pull together all of my interests in neurodivergence, in counseling skills, working with teens, um, you know, love of higher education. Uh, it was just a natural fit. So I kind of switched over to found top college consultants, and now we work with students around the country, primarily students with learning differences or emotional challenges to, as you said, successfully apply to and transition to college.

SPEAKER_03 5:51

You know, you have uh a very unique combination of being a consultant and and doing the work you do there, but you're also a psychologist. So you you bring together, you know, some some really special skills. Um and I I'd like to hear a little more about that, but also um, we had a conversation with you on the podcast, um, and we've determined it was five years ago. Um, so that's been a while. Um, we were in the middle of COVID at the time. Um, but I'm curious also how your work has changed over the years. Not just not just these past five years, although that's you know, things are different now. But have you uh how has your work evolved?

SPEAKER_02 6:38

Yeah, well, let me tackle you. You were asking, I always ask these double questions.

SPEAKER_03 6:44

I'm sorry.

Psychology Skills In College Consulting

SPEAKER_02 6:45

Double double barreled questions, my my dissertation advisor used to call them. Um, yeah, so to talk about being a psychologist first, um, everyone, so being an educational consultant, it's a it's a wonderful profession. Uh people are so supportive. We're all dedicated to helping child students succeed, um, equity in education. And um, we're really supportive of each other. And when I and and we've all come from different fields. So, you know, I know educational consultants who are lawyers, doctors, engineers, computer scientists, you name it, people who've been in the entertainment business. Uh, but again, we share that passion for helping students succeed. I wasn't really sure coming in as a psychologist with a mental health background how that would play out being a consultant. It turns out it's been extremely helpful. Uh, one of the areas, first of all, as you can imagine, these days families are really stressed out about the college application process. And people have told me throughout my career that I have a calming presence. So I've maybe maybe it's just that I don't have much affect, but what whatever it is, um, it seems like that helps students kind of get through this process and keep them emotionally tethered as they go through the ups and downs of high school and applying to college. But especially when they're working on their essays, there's a lot of self-reflection that goes into the college admissions essays. They're very different from what students are used to writing in high school or in college if they're applying to a grad school. And so students often get kind of thrown off by that. But having, you know, been a listening professional for a long time and helping people kind of self-reflect, it really comes very naturally to me. Plus, um, I'm a lifelong writer and editor on top of that. So I love helping helping folks with the writing process. So that was your first question.

SPEAKER_03 8:46

Oh, oh, right. And then we all need that calming influence these days. So that's we certainly hear students have so much anxiety.

SPEAKER_02 8:55

Yeah, I mean, you know, especially with the pandemic, anxiety just skyrocketed. I'm sure you see that in the college setting too. Um, so and then you also asked uh how my work has changed. Um, you know, we've we've really doubled down on serving students with disabilities. Uh sometimes there's students with other kinds of disabilities, um, which has been really fulfilling as well. We see so many of our students struggle with executive functioning. Um, my team has grown, you know. Uh so again, I have a nationwide team of consultants working with students around the country. Some of the folks on my team also do executive function coaching or academic coaching. So that's really helpful. And we've kind of uh specialized or carved out our niches a bit. One of the folks on my team who happens to be in Massachusetts specializes in transfer students who are transferring from one college to another. Someone else on my team does um work with recruited athletes. So it's been great to be able to serve a diversity of students. And um Yeah, those are some of the key things.

SPEAKER_00 10:11

Well, I have one question for you. Okay.

SPEAKER_03 10:14

She's gonna be easy on you.

SPEAKER_00 10:18

Um I'm curious to know. Um, you know, I've worked with students with with um with disabilities, and you know, how do you how do you find help students find the right college? Um, how do you go about doing that? And and how do you how do you tell whether colleges you know offer the right amount of services? Um, but anyway, I'll let you go ahead with that.

Shifts Since COVID And Team Growth

Finding Colleges With Real Supports

SPEAKER_02 10:43

Well, well, as as you well know, there's different levels of support available. Um sometimes when when families of children with disabilities start touring colleges, they'll they'll ask questions, typically of the admissions folks. Hey, my kid has ADHD, dyslexia, autism. Um, what do you have for them? And the admissions folks are in somewhat of a marketing capacity. Um, so they'll say, oh, we have this great disability service center that can provide accommodations and you register and you get all this stuff that you also got in high school. And it sounds great, but folks need to realize that all colleges, for the most part, provide that by federal law as a bare minimum. So that's kind of the minimum standard. But again, as you well know, there's there's other colleges that go above and beyond, whether it's a sort of what I think of as a la carte services or one-off services like peer mentoring or academic coaching. And then there's a smaller number of, as you sort of, you know, move up the pyramid, so to speak, you get to a smaller number of colleges, a fraction of the total number of colleges that have robust, comprehensive support programs, learning support programs as, or autism programs, or autism support programs, as indeed Curry College has. And I've actually made a list or a database of those colleges, which is freely available on the website. It's sortable. So you can, if you're looking just for colleges in Texas or Ohio or wherever, you can you can sort it and have described what the services are, what the cost of the program is. Families don't always realize that there is a cost. Uh, so it's important to sort of figure out, back to your question of, you know, how do you go navigate the college search? What do you need in a college? Of course, students with disabilities still have all the usual suspects in terms of factors for choosing a college. Does it have the major that I that I'm interested in? Does it have the, is it the right size for me? Is it the right setting, you know, urban, suburban, uh, the right part of the country? There's lots of things that go into what students are looking for, size, cost. But there's this added layer for students who are neurodivergent or have other kinds of disabilities, which is, is it gonna support me in the way that I need to? And that could be sort of cultural or environmental in the sense of, hey, I'm kind of quirky or my kid is is kind of quirky. Are they gonna feel at home? Are they gonna make friends? Are they gonna feel welcomed versus marginalized? Or it could be more sort of pragmatic. Um, my child needs a support program where they can meet with a learning specialist, you know, X number of times a week who can help them with assignments, help them navigate college, uh, et cetera, or maybe meet with a peer mentor who can help them get to clubs and sort of make some social connections and develop a social life. Because maybe they either had trouble making friends in high school, or they had friends, but they were friends that they've had since they were in kindergarten, and they need to, you know, be able to make new friends in college where they don't know anybody. So we're helping families assess what are your child's needs, and then what are the types of colleges that offer those. And it is a series of conversations, questionnaires, etc. It isn't just, hey, my kid has ADHD, where should they apply to college?

SPEAKER_00 14:17

Right. I spent some time looking at your the list of schools you have, and it's incredibly impressive. Um, that must have taken a lot of time. I mean, you I assume you keep adding and I do, yes. Um it's a ma it's wonderful.

SPEAKER_02 14:31

Yeah, you know, if I learn of a new program out there, and you know, Curry has added programs, of course. Uh, then I well, I mean, Curry's been on the list since the very beginning, but uh, I'll keep adding programs. You know, if I find out uh the cost of a program has gone up, I go into the database and revise the cost. And that's an again, you know, not to harp on cost, but that's important for families to know that they're thinking about often, you know, what's the tuition, what's the cost of room and board. There's this extra piece in some cases for support. And that needs to be factored in when you're thinking about which college can we afford. Now, you know, not to go for too far down that rabbit hole. Sometimes families will get support from other sources, like uh vocational rehab departments in their particular state, but that's on a state by by state basis.

SPEAKER_00 15:28

You know, I just want to ask one general question here because you've been in the field for a long time, and I'm curious to know um how you see like have colleges and universities become more open and accessible? Or like have you seen the growth of that or not?

SPEAKER_02 15:47

Yeah, that's a great question. Uh uh a number of things have changed. So I'm on the board of the College Autism Network, um, and in Ireland, there's a charity called As I Am that developed this template for universities to become autism friendly. So we've been talking about support programs, and it's great that those are out there. To me, the gold standard, the ultimate goal that I'd like to see us get to, not just in higher education, but in workplaces and organizations in general, is universal design, where spaces, where organizations are designed to be welcoming for everyone. And that takes the burden off of the student. One of the challenges, as you well know, for students as they transition from high school to college, is that instead of the high school sort of doing everything for them, delivering their 504 IEP plan, students have to do a lot more of the work of self-identifying, talking to professors, and et cetera. When you have universal design, then everyone gets their needs met. Just like you know, if there's a ramp and you travel by wheelchair, you don't have to ask for some help to get up a curb. You everyone can get up the curb, or if you're you know on a skateboard or what have you. So uh back to your question of what's changing College Autism Network is trying to help colleges in the US become autism friendly and sort of certify which colleges are welcoming as a whole. So that's one trend that we've seen some universities think about as a whole. How can we be welcoming to neurodivergent or disabled students, not just what you know, one-off programs or services do we need to add? Uh, a second trend would be that I'm just seeing more colleges offer programs. So that's great that the number of programs, the size of our database has grown over the years. A third is that you see some students who really lean into their identity, who are proud of being disabled or neurodivergent, are starting and running clubs or organizations, student-run organizations in college, so that, you know, instead of being something that they are secretive or hiding, they are out and proud. And uh that's great. The students can find like-minded other students. And then, you know, a more recent trend, unfortunately, has been sort of the sort of backlash against DEI in colleges in the past year or so, which I think could have some potential spillover to um programs that support students with disabilities.

SPEAKER_03 18:36

We'll have to keep our eyes on that as we go forward.

Cost, Funding, And Hidden Fees

SPEAKER_02 18:40

And on a you know, side note, New York Times just today came out with an article about the increasing numbers of students with disabilities in college.

SPEAKER_00 18:50

Really? Well, I can bring that up.

Toward Autism-Friendly, Universal Design

SPEAKER_02 18:52

Now, of course, when you talk about and it's huge increases in the number of students disclosing disabilities in college, important, of course, to distinguish does that mean there's more students with ADHD or autism or mental health issues in college, or that they've been identified, or that they're more comfortable disclosing. It's probably the two latter factors. More students are getting diagnosed. Sure, there may be more students with mental health issues, um, but also students are are starting to disclose more.

SPEAKER_04 19:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:29

I see that also.

SPEAKER_03 19:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 19:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 19:32

Well, I want to take a little bit of a turn. Um and and we will I'm backing up, we'll we'll put your database in the show notes so people can get to your website and find that um because it's massively helpful. Um, but what I uh you mentioned earlier about graduate students, and I'd like to ask you a little bit about that because that's an area we we work so hard to help parents understand the the admission process and getting into college and then helping students succeed in college. And and sometimes I think we neglect the next step, which for probably the majority of students is moving into a career. But there are some students who want to go on to graduate programs of one kind or another. And I'm curious how how the advice that you would give to students and parents might be different uh you know in that kind of application process. Um, knowing, of course, that by the time a student is applying to graduate school, hopefully parents have stepped back a little bit, but maybe, maybe not. Um so so what is it like for for students applying to that next step?

Grad School Applications Demystified

SPEAKER_02 20:54

Um yeah, great, great question. I love working with students applying to grad school. It is so much fun. I mean, they're significantly older, so they tend to be more mature. They also tend to be more sort of in charge of things. And in fact, many times I never even meet the parents. So as far as advice for parents, they're often not in the picture at all. I have had some students who are still in college, you know, who are college seniors, where the parents are more in the picture because the students are so busy with their work in college. So parents are, you know, helping out. Um, the process, so there's stuff that's similar in terms of applying to grad school, and there's stuff that's different. It's similar in the sense you have to come up with a list of schools or programs you apply to, figure out, you know, where you have a chance of getting in. There may be standardized testing involved, the GRE as opposed to the SAT, um, although, of course, that's that's changed with the pandemic. And then there are essays involved. So, in the broad strokes, it it may sound like a similar process, but in other ways it's quite different. And sometimes when I talk to high school students who are not very happy academically because they have to take all these courses they don't like, you know, in high school, every year it's history, math, English, social studies, uh, science. And what if you're just interested in math and science? Or what if you're just interested in humanities and you still have to take these other courses? Well, I tell them, you know, it's gonna get better in college. You know, in college, you pick your major, you're gonna take a bunch of courses in that area that you really like and may not have to take that many other courses depending on the the college, because of course curricula vary in colleges. But then in grad school, it's gonna get even better because you're just gonna focus on that one thing you love and that's it. And you know, you could be an expert in one arcane area, esoteric area of history or science or art, and you can just dive into that. You don't have to take all those other courses. So, and that is also reflected in the application process, right? So, when you're applying to college as a high school student, you're listing all these activities. You were on this club, you played this sport, you play this musical instrument. Colleges want to know all the stuff you do. Um, and when you're applying to grad school, it's more laser focused. So colleges care about, you know, the courses that you took relevant to the area of study you're planning to study in in grad school. So I work with being a psychologist, I love working with students who are future mental health professionals. They want to know, you know, what psych courses you took in college. If you took a bunch of art electives, that's great, but that's not really going to help you get into a psych program. So, you know, it's those those grades and and courses related to your intended area of study in grad school. It's the experience you have, the the work experience, um, in the case of, say, you know, clinical psychology, clinical work, research experience, and and those are the key things. So it's pretty focused. It's not all this other stuff of what are your hobbies and stuff. And that's all again also reflected in the the essay, so to speak, typically called a statement of purpose or SOP or something along those lines, where the students talking about why I want to study, why do I want to study physics in grad school, what's led me to this point, what do I want to focus on in grad school? How does that tie into my career? So it's it's past, present, and future in terms of that area of study and that career, not you know, your all this other stuff that you might talk about in essays applying to college.

SPEAKER_03 24:46

Uh that's really helpful. And I love that that sort of funnel analogy, um, which which might help drive some students through some of those gen ed courses that are not their favorites in in college, but seeing that down the line you'll you'll really get to get better and better.

SPEAKER_02 25:06

And you can, you know, you can look for colleges if if if you are sort of laser focused, you can look for colleges that have a more open curriculum that don't have a lot of gen ed requirements. There are a handful of colleges that have very few requirements outside of your major, except for typically a freshman English class. Um, whereas other colleges have a robust core curriculum, which some students like. There are also students who are like, this is great. I'm gonna get a liberal arts education, a real solid foundation. Nothing wrong with that.

SPEAKER_03 25:38

And sometimes they discover something that they never thought about and they love.

SPEAKER_02 25:44

Yeah, yeah. I mean, I took courses in all kinds of stuff in college and and discovered things, you just I don't remember how I randomly took some anthropology courses and I was like, this is really interesting. Um by the time I discovered I was already far along in being an English major, but um, you know, if I didn't have that flexibility, I never would have known.

SPEAKER_03 26:05

Yeah, that's good. There's another area that I think we would be negligent if we didn't talk to you about, um, because it's something that all of us everywhere are trying to come to terms with, and that's AI. Um and how that is affecting um the application process or anything you know about students. I mean, I think I may be wrong, and you'll correct me on this, but I think students are kind of getting the message that it's probably not the best thing to just ask AI to write your essay, um, your application essay, but beyond, and if I'm wrong about that, maybe that maybe they are doing that uh exclusively, then correct me. But uh, how has it affected the process or how can they use it productively? What what's what's the relationship?

AI’s Role In Admissions And Planning

SPEAKER_02 26:59

So that is a huge topic, and as you can imagine these days, uh my colleagues and I are talking about this all the time. It is, you know, webinars and meetings. Uh it seems like past one to two years, it's all anyone can talk about. Uh so huge impacts, and let's keep in mind the the it's on both sides of the desk. It isn't just students, colleges are using AI to evaluate applications, to evaluate students who are applying to college. Um and in some cases, well, in many cases, telling students you can't use your your AI for your application. So it's it's a delicate um landscape at the moment. Uh but colleges have seen skyrocketing numbers of applications, so they're turning to any number of tools, including AI, to help evaluate. It's not in place of human beings, it's to supplement what human beings are doing in terms of looking at at um college applications. So it's it's on the other side too. And there are colleges that are telling students everyone while in college has to develop some AI. Um what's the word?

SPEAKER_00 28:17

Literacy.

SPEAKER_02 28:18

Literacy, yes, that's what I was looking for. AI literacy. So just like you know, before it was computers, you have to have basic understanding of computers to you know function in the modern world. Uh now it's AI. Of course, there are colleges where you can major in AI-related majors. So it is absolutely being embraced in some ways as a useful tool. Of course, you know, when ChatGPT came out, the big worry is uh students are going to use this to write their essays for college. And what are the implications of that? Um, it's it's gotten complicated. Colleges, I think, in some cases, or whether it's the application process or students in college courses looking for ways to evaluate students where they can't lean on other tools, like you know, a live interview or asking students to write things in class on the spot where they they can't use other tools. We certainly don't want students using AI in their essays. Um, it is this the essays are supposed to be really personal, really share something about you, and AI can't replicate that. Um I've put it in my contract that that students can't use those kinds of tools when they're writing their essays. Students have to sign off when they when they submit the common app, that they haven't, that all of their work is their own. So there's there's a lot of reasons why students shouldn't. But you know, students are in fact using AI very regularly in in mass numbers for a whole lot of things, including emotional, social, emotional things. That's kind of a companion, which is a whole other topic. Uh, but they need to be really thoughtful. Yes, these tools can be really useful in terms of organizing your thoughts and providing structure, kind of saying, hey, gosh, I'm going into the college admissions process and I have all these tasks I need to do. Ask me some questions to help me organize my college admissions plan. So I could absolutely see using AI to help you map out a plan. Or, you know, I've got 15 colleges in the Northeast that I'm interested in in touring, help me come up with a plan, an efficient way of visiting them, decide, you know, how many I should visit per day, all that stuff. You can use it for all kinds of things.

SPEAKER_00 30:46

Organization, that I mean, that makes sense to me, that it could be a plus for that.

SPEAKER_02 30:50

Yeah. I I helped give a high school principal from another country a tour of a bunch of colleges, including Curry, uh, several years ago. And I spent so many hours looking at maps and figuring out what's the most efficient way to get from point A to point B. Now it would take you know one minute from with AI.

Gap Years, PG Options, And Part-Time Paths

SPEAKER_00 31:09

That's true. Um, let's see. I am back to asking about trends. I'm curious to know if you've seen some trends involving or about um students going taking gap year programs or students doing um post-grad programs. Do you see more flexibility with part-time school? You know, some of the you know, alternative ways to approach school.

SPEAKER_02 31:41

Yeah, well, part-time, I'll just speak about that real briefly, I think. Um if students want to go to college part-time, a good option is community college where you can work part-time or full-time and take one or two courses at a time and kind of dip your feet in the water and and then take as long as you need to to finish your your associate's degree, and then maybe later transfer somewhere else for the bachelor's if you want. Um part-time education at a four-year college is is a lot trickier. You can sometimes get a disability waiver or accommodation of being able to have a reduced course load and still get the benefits of full-time, but it is not a slam dunk. It's not something families or students can count on getting at a four-year college. It exists, but it's it's a college-by-college basis. So um, back to the gap here and post-PG or post-grad question. Uh, it's something I've been in favor of all along. I think with the pandemic, you saw more students leaning into it. Like, hey, I don't want Zoom school in college, I don't enjoy it in in high school, so I'm gonna take a year off and wait for things to settle down. So I think I think that drove some of the growth in gap year options, but there's benefits for students across the board. I I love it when students are open to gap years. I encourage students to consider it. What I find is that a lot of students rule it out right off the bat. Nope, not interested. I want to go straight to college. My friends are going straight to college. I don't want to take a gap year. I think sometimes they just don't understand what a gap year means because it could mean almost anything. It could mean writing a novel, it could mean um working full-time, it could be traveling around the country, or if you need help becoming more college ready, it could be mean going to a PG or gap year program, specifically for neurodivergent students, to build college readiness, social skills, academic readiness, executive function skills. And that's true for a lot of our students. A lot of our students could use that extra year, an extra year of working on those skills so that when they get to college, going back to my you know, our very first topic, they can they can stay in and graduate and not drop out because uh they weren't ready.

SPEAKER_00 34:18

Lots of good information here.

SPEAKER_02 34:20

And I'm seeing more gap year and PG year programs come online. Yes. Um, of course, curry being a one example, but uh you know, I do sort of keep tabs on those programs. Sometimes students will go to a program that isn't technically a gap year program, but sort of works as a gap year program, a program for neurodivergent students, whether they're in college or going to college later. So there's a lot of options out there in addition to the sort of official gap year programs.

SPEAKER_03 34:50

And and is it true that some students may take, may get, may apply to college, be accepted, and then decide to take a gap year program. They defer so that they know at the end of their gap year they have a place. Yes. Um and other students might choose to do the opposite, to do the gap year and then apply because they're going to be able, they're going to be better ready, and perhaps their admission packet may look different. Exactly. Exactly.

SPEAKER_02 35:20

Yeah, good point, Vicky. I uh I love to see students apply in senior year when they can, um, but there are situations, as you mentioned, where they are better off waiting. I'm working with a student right now who's high school senior, she's not planning to apply. Uh, she didn't apply during senior year. She's gonna do a gap year. She has two interests, and she's gonna split up her gap year to explore both of these interests so that when it comes time to apply, she'll have a better sense of what am I going to college to study? And she's gonna be more focused when she gets to college, and it's gonna help her inform her college list.

SPEAKER_03 35:57

Yeah. And I suppose a student who applies and defers, uh, you're not locked in. You could you could reapply somewhere else. And right.

SPEAKER_02 36:09

Um you do put down a deposit and you are telling the college that I'm gonna enroll in a year. Um, and you know, sorry, colleges, but it is it is true that a college that a student could say, you know what, during that gap year, I discovered that I actually want to major in something else that that college doesn't offer. So I'm rescinding my, you know, I'm backing out of that. You might lose the deposit, and of course the college would be disappointed, but sure, you you can do that.

SPEAKER_03 36:36

It's probably less less common that that way.

SPEAKER_02 36:39

Yeah, I haven't seen it a lot, but it's nice to know that that you're you're not, as you said, absolutely locked in.

What Matters More Than College Name

SPEAKER_03 36:44

Right. Um so you have given us so many pieces of advice and that parents can take and students can take, and and there's you know, discover how much is involved. If you had to give one piece of advice to the parents of a student whose first child, or I hate to say child, the first kid is going off to college. What what would one be one thing you would really want them to know or think about?

SPEAKER_02 37:17

Yeah, I mean, there are so many.

SPEAKER_03 37:20

I know that you see you don't like my double questions while I'm asking.

SPEAKER_02 37:25

But I I I I will I'll, you know, for for this this round, what I'll go with is You can have a couple. You know, we parents often focus a lot on the name of the college. You know, can my kid get into an Ivy League school or you know, a NISCAC school or or some school that that we think has a good reputation because we think that's gonna help them, you know, have a great career and a great life if they go to a so-called good college. So the the piece of advice is to help your child realize that it's more about what they do in college than where they go. And so start thinking about what are some of the things you should really be working on in college to set yourself up for a successful experience in college and after college, such as finding a mentor, connecting with a professor or someone else in college who can take you under their wing and help you. Maybe it's somebody in the career center. Uh, by all means, take advantage of the resources like the career center, counseling center, the tutoring center to get the most out of you know, those big tuition bucks you're spending. Do something experiential like study abroad, get an internship. Not you don't have to pick one. Employers love to see internships. Um, I didn't do study abroad technically when I was in college, but I did spend some time in South America. And after I graduated college, that was like the one thing employers wanted to talk about. What were you doing in Columbia? Tell me about that. So, you know, do something interesting and different in college, both to, you know, it's gonna be a great experience for you, but it's also gonna help make you more appealing to employers. So there's a variety of things that that research has shown helps you have a more successful make college be be life-changing, as it were. Um, versus thinking like if my kid can just get into this college, then everything will fall into place.

SPEAKER_03 39:28

Yeah, good advice.

Older Autistic Adults: The Lost Generation

SPEAKER_00 39:31

I don't want you to leave before I ask this one last this question. Um, and I am really curious. Um I want to know if you could talk a little bit about the book that you wrote with two colleagues about about adults, um, older autistic adults. And I'm I'm asking because I think many of our parents would be really interested. Um, there aren't there's not that much information out there.

SPEAKER_02 39:56

Yeah, and that's one of the reasons why we wrote it. Of course, we're we're really shifting gears here away from the world.

SPEAKER_00 40:01

I know, a total shift.

SPEAKER_02 40:02

From teenagers to to the parents, yeah, to older autistic adults. Um, we those of us who are writing the book were over 50 ourselves, uh-huh, and uh and we surveyed 150 over age 50 autistic adults around the world, primarily the US and the UK. Um, and we just got the word out and distributed the survey. It was a long survey, a lot of questions. So gave us just a very rich source of material to draw on, to quote people who who filled out the survey, as well as you know, some summaries of what we could gather from the survey. For example, you know, over 80% of folks reported um having felt that they were bullied in as a child growing up. Um, the vast majority, almost everyone in the study, didn't get diagnosed with autism until after age 40. So if you were growing up back then, before autism was so widely diagnosed and widely understood, uh, so many people flew under the radar and didn't figure it out until they were adults. And a lot of people had the experience of like, wow, this explains so much. Now I understand myself, I understand why people have reacted to me the way they have throughout my life. Um, so really interesting interviews. Um, and as you said, there's so little written. You know, I I did a literature search as part of preparing to write the book. And when I found articles on the topic, every article I found, and there weren't many, said there's not much research on this topic. That was the conclusion of most of the handful of articles I I found. And uh, you know, Tony Atwood, who's one of the world experts on uh what is used to be called Asperger Syndrome, uh, who wrote um the forward for the book um has sort of helped promote the book because he says, you know, there's there's just so little on this topic.

SPEAKER_00 42:13

I would agree. I'm thrilled that you did it. So you've told us a lot about the book, but tell us the title.

SPEAKER_02 42:19

Oh, it's called Older Artistic Adults. Oh, okay. Older artistic adults in their own Yeah. Okay. Go ahead and uh No, no, you were gonna say Oh, yeah, older artistic adults in their own words, the lost generation. It's kind of a long title, but if you look for older artistic adults on Amazon or whatever, okay, we will link to we'll link to it in the show notes.

SPEAKER_03 42:40

Yeah. And you know, you said this is really uh pivoting away from you know talking to teenagers, but it occurs to me that um some of the parents that are listening to this, because they have perhaps an autistic um child in high school getting ready for college or or in college, um their child is going to become an autistic adult. And so parents may be interested in knowing what's down the road.

SPEAKER_02 43:10

Um and and it's yeah, and I think there's uh a big genetic component. So some of the parents are autistic themselves and don't know it. And I'm not in the business of diagnosing, you know, I'm a psychologist, so I used to diagnose people, but I'm not diagnosing my students or their parents. But there's a lot of neurodivergent parents. Some of them know it, some of them tell me, you know, I have ADHD or I think I have ADHD or autism. Other ones, I have a sense that they're neurodivergent. Um, but you know, they can they can explore that on their own.

SPEAKER_03 43:43

So there's a there are a lot of reasons per people might be interested in the book, either for themselves or thinking uh about the future. We all get over there and child.

SPEAKER_02 43:52

And there's a lot of concern about you know the the so called services cliff when when kids reach twenty one, twenty two. Depending on the state where where the huge amount of support they had in the K-12 system just kind of vanishes overnight.

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