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After this week, I feel so much more confident
in myself as an autistic person, and I feel like
I am in the right place.
This week meant that this is actually
an identity for me. This was actually many
first times, and I'm realizing my identity
this is the first time that I've ever realized
I have a sense of humor. This is first time that I've
actually been in a group where I've bonded with
people and didn't have to feel like I was an outsider,
and I've learned I'll forever remember this week.
It meant being in an environment and community of
people who respect me and accept me, and it
helped me learn more about me, and helped me learn
what my strengths and the areas in which I need to grow are
Before I came to ACI, I thought that to be a leader,
you had to have a certain kind of personality.
And that was one that I didn't have. That was in part
because of the internalized ableism I had over the years,
where whenever I would get upset about something,
I was told that the best thing I could do was to
not talk about it. That to be a bigger person- you just had to
let it go. And I struggled with my feelings about this, where
I would be very angry and passionate about certain issues
but I didn't think that I, as someone with a disability,
could change anything. And now that I've been around
all these other people that share my views, and I've
learned how to effectively communicate what I feel about
these issues and the causes that I want to fight for,
I've realized that there isn't any use in being silent about
it, and I'm hopefully going to get fulfillment by speaking out,
and advocating what I believe.
What did I learn this week?
I learned a lot.
What we did was we first learned the history of the
disability rights movement, especially in the context
of autism. We met with a bunch of different organizations
devoted to expanding disability rights to the general public
and accessibility. We also learned how to put together a
small organization on our campuses, and in general
how to advocate. And also we went to the capitol to talk with
senator's staff about various legislation that's currently
being pushed in office.
One of the things I did this week was I learned a lot about
training, leadership, and coalition building.
We had a lot of different panels and information sessions
on how to be an effective advocate for disability rights.
In the middle of the week we went to visit the department
of education and the department of labor to learn more
about what they do there.
I had learned a lot of fun skills based on what
advocacy is all about.
The most informative session for me was definitely
the one about student communities, student groups.
How to go about organizing a student group at my college.
My advocacy so far has been very cultural,
culturally based? I learned a lot about policy advocacy.
Now I'm actually going to know how to make this happen,
instead of I just would like this to be a thing,
It will be, I know how to make this a thing.
Think of it as a four step process, if you want to run
a good meeting. So, the first step is that- and this sounds
kind of weird- you have a meeting with yourself.
My favorite part was getting to speak to my senator because
I felt like I truly made a difference.
I would say probably the hill visits, because it really
felt like it was the culmination of everything we had done
and putting that advocacy into action was really
nice, invigorating for me and really inspiring.
I really liked the session we had on coalition building,
because the speaker that gave us that one was very
dynamic and engaging and fun to listen to.
I've been able to learn and communicate with a lot of
other autistic people like me.
Another part that was my favorite was autistic space.
I felt that not only did I have communication badges,
where I could let others know whether or not I
wanted to speak, but it was more like being able to
engage and not have to hide my autistic symptoms
and not be judged for it.
I'm planning on trying to start a group on campus
at my college for autistic students, because I
liked being in a community of autistic people here
and I want to give other people that experience.
I'm going to take what I've learned about social activism
and disability rights back to my campus.
I'm hoping to get involved in both of the scenes there
for disability rights advocacy. And within my college,
I'm hoping to start a cross disability coalition.
And I'm probably going to try to use some of this
coalition building stuff to get to actually work with some
of the other diversity groups, more than I've been
able to before .
I'm now hoping for a career in policy building when it
comes to people with disabilities and healthcare policy
especially, which is why I'm studying public health.
And I feel like the skills that I've built with ACI would actually
help me in building the necessary relationships
and maintaining the necessary influence that I need to
promote advocacy the way I want to.
I would highly encourage people like you guys to
apply for this.
I'm definitely recommending ACI to my friends.
This is a fantastic place to be.
I would most definitely recommend ACI to my friends.
I would absolutely recommend ACI to
other autistic college students.
I wholly recommend to people .
I would definitely recommend ACI to my friends.
I definitely would.
Definitely.
Yes, definitely. This is probably the most empowering
experience that I've had in my life.