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Conference Highlights Potential of Autistic Children, Need for Understanding

Keynote speaker Brenda Smith Myles talks about the Comprehensive Autism Planning System at the third annual V.I. Autism Conference Wednesday on St. Croix.A roomful of St. Croix parents and teachers spent the day learning how to tap into the unlimited potential of autistic children during the third annual V.I. Conference on Autism held Wednesday at UVI’s Great Hall.
The conference, sponsored by the V.I. University Center for Excellence in Developmental Disabilities and the V.I. Autism Network, drew an audience of some 200 to hear leading experts in the field of autism research.
Autism is on the rise, or at least the diagnosis of autism is on the rise, according to Brenda Smith Myles, the conference’s keynote speaker. Myles, chief program officer for the Autism Society of America, said two U.S. studies last year estimated the prevalence of autism at roughly 1 percent.
A newer study from the United Kingdom, which Myles said is usually two to three years ahead of the United States in studying autism, put the estimate at 4 percent.
People with autism often display behavioral patterns that the people in their lives consider inappropriate, difficult or random. But Myles said that all behavior serves a purpose. There’s a reason for it, even in the case of a person with autism, who is doing something that seems to make no sense.
“The reason is to communicate,” she said.
People with autism usually don’t understand their feelings, Myles said, so they usually aren’t aware they’re growing frustrated or angry.
“Punishment is not the way to deal with them,” she said. “Imagine what your life would be like if you couldn’t tell you were becoming frustrated. And then imagine that you didn’t know how to calm yourself. Imagine what your life would be like.”
Myles presented the audience with a series of strategies for dealing with students with autism to help them cope with these feelings before they become problems. The Comprehensive Autism Planning System creates a structure for instruction. It requires planning beforehand, follow-through and faithful record keeping, but the result gives students the best chance for getting the most out of their educational experiences, she said.
Identifying people with autism early is a key to getting them the specialized learning environment they need and deserve, Gov. John deJongh Jr. said in his opening remarks.
“A child with autism doesn’t have time,” the governor said.
DeJongh said over the last couple of years, the territory has been preoccupied with dealing with the world’s economic downturn, the weak local job market and other issues, but they haven’t forgotten the needs of people with disabilities, those who are often the least able to help themselves.
The governor not only appointed a program coordinator for the territory’s Americans with Disabilities Act but asked each department to identify a representatives on both St. Croix and St. Thomas to be in charge of ADA compliance.
“There’s a need for us to do more and be more consistent,” he said.
Other sessions during the daylong event were led by Sheila M. Smith, assistant director for the Ohio Center for Autism and Low Incidence; Lisa Bass, a parent advocate and mother of a child with autism; and Thomas M. Caffrey, a board-certified behavior analyst who specializes in developing evidence-based programs for children with autism.

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