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Few autistic students register with university disability office
The rates of students with autism attending college are likely higher than previous studies conveyed, according to a Michigan State University study.
The study concluded there are between 135,400 to 286,254 autistic undergraduates in college in the United States.
However, colleges likely undercount how many students have autism – about half of high schoolers with autism continue on to college, but only four percent of these register with the school’s disability services office.
This study relied on a larger data pool than past studies, psychology doctoral student and study co-author Kayden Stockwell told The Fix via email.
The Michigan State study included data from surveys of American college students, the Institute of Education Sciences, and academic studies. The researchers also compared the rates of autistic high school students entering college with the percentage of autistic students who disclosed their diagnosis with their university.
The study produced a “range of estimates,” highlighting the complexity of finding an exact number for autistic college students in the United States.
The graduate student said the burden is on colleges to change the culture around autism and to make resources more accessible to students who are struggling.
“Importantly, colleges should work directly with autistic students to identify where barriers exist and develop solutions that students themselves find accessible and useful,” he said. “This kind of collaboration can make support more effective and gives autistic students a meaningful role in shaping their education.”
Stockwell said colleges should promote community-building for autistic students, as well as encouraging the development of college disability support offices.
“Effective support isn’t just about providing accommodations when a student encounters a barrier,” Stockwell said. “It’s about building a campus environment that expects and welcomes disabled students, where accommodations are supported across the institution, and where disabled students have opportunities to find community and belong.”
The president of the College Autism Spectrum said this new academic paper is stronger than past research, despite limitations on the data set.
“[T]he authors are very clear that the underlying data are inconsistent and that the resulting estimates should be considered suggestive rather than conclusive,” Ann Rutherford told The Fix.
“Much of the available data also comes from older cohorts, which creates an important limitation when we are trying to understand today’s college students,” she said.
The new paper is “an important and credible contribution” to the “fragmented” “data landscape.”
Rutherford said “one of the most important findings may be that we still need better, more current, and more consistent data on autistic students in higher education.”
Like Stockwell, the College Autism Spectrum president said colleges need to find new ways to equip their faculty and student success services to support neurodivergent students.
“The goal should be to build capacity across the entire institution and administrative buy-in to making small changes that have big impacts not just for the autistic students,” she said, “but for all students within student success, advising, tutoring, career services, disability services, residence life, faculty development, and other areas.”
This will help staffers “better understand and support neurodivergent students.”
Colleges across the country, meanwhile, have seen an increase in disability accommodations, as previously reported by The Fix.
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