'Agricultural specialisterne': rural employment revolution for those with Autism

[Visionary7903]

The subject of the previous post was the Eden II and Genesis Foundation. Formerly known as the Foundation for the Advancement of Autistic Persons (FAAP), the organisation’s primary purpose is to provide much needed funds for programs and services that support individuals with Autism. The Eden II School for Autistic Children, located in Staten Island, New York, was founded in 1976 after FAAP parents identified an existing successful program–the Eden Institute (located in Princeton, New Jersey).

The Eden Institute’s new facility incorporates in its design what I described in an earlier post–‘Neuro-typical’ environments that can prepare the Autistic individual for the outside world by potentially helping such an individual develop generalisation skills, which are often poor in Autism. So the Eden Institute incorporates frequent ‘generalisation’ exercises in which pupils venture into the neighboring food court and stores or work in some of the restaurants…

…At Eden, the balance between the outside world and the school’s safe harbor takes on yet a different character. …Eden is in a mixed-use complex, with retail, offices, a hotel, and restaurants. The site was chosen for a purpose. Eden’s previous home, in a former telephone-switching station, was isolated. …[The mixed-use complex] allows the school to share resources, such as a health-club swimming pool.

Unique to Eden is its mini Wawa convenience store, staffed by supervised students and open part-time to the public. (The Wawa chain is a corporate partner of the school.) So the interface with the outside world is very real. But at the same time, the building also makes sensory accommodation.

Designed by KSS Architects, the 38,300-square-foot facility incorporates an existing 12,900-square-foot houselike, gabled structure. KSS retained the intimate scale and form, giving the new section a contrasting flat roof and modest massing. The configuration, which accommodates early-intervention and outreach programs along with the day school for 62 students, aged 3 to 21, centers around a courtyard with a protected outdoor play area and a multipurpose gym. As in all these schools, exercise is important for both its calming effects and motor-skill development.

While the wide, daylit corridors are straight shots, changes in floor-tile colors signal classroom entrances. The flexible teaching rooms …are designed for round tables, high faculty-student ratios, and ample maneuvering space, rather than blackboard-oriented lecture seating. These classrooms also have rows of small side rooms, offering a scale shift for more focused learning.

An unusual feature is each classroom’s home-style kitchen (in addition to the school’s professional cafeteria kitchen, where vocational training occurs). Here the daily life-learning curriculum actively involves students in lunch preparation, from grocery shopping to dishwasher loading.

While Eden’s visual connections to daylight and surrounding greenery are strong, its sensory controls are subtle. They include indirect lighting, high-rated acoustic separations, muted natural colors, a large frosted window in the gym to diffuse distracting views, and an alarm system with a strobe specially synchronized to reduce jarring effects…

Some images of the new facility can be viewed via the following links:
http://archrecord.construction.com/projects/Building_Types_Study/K-12/2013/Schools-for-children-with-ASD-slideshow.asp?slide=7
http://archrecord.construction.com/projects/Building_Types_Study/K-12/2013/Schools-for-children-with-ASD-slideshow.asp?slide=8
http://archrecord.construction.com/projects/Building_Types_Study/K-12/2013/Schools-for-children-with-ASD-slideshow.asp?slide=9

(sources: Foundation for the Advancement of Autistic Persons - FAAP | causes.com; http://archrecord.construction.com/projects/building_types_study/K-12/2013/Schools-for-children-with-ASD.asp)