The students — about 60 are expected this fall — have various degrees of disability, often with related developmental disorders. One communicates through a picture board and an iPad; a helper supports her arm as she taps out words. Another, a movie buff who wrote a play for his theater class, has Asperger’s syndrome. A sports enthusiast who interned this past spring with the Syracuse Orange men’s basketball team has Down syndrome.
During the first three years, the students choose “majors” and audit five to six college classes that align with their interests. They complete homework and take tests, ungraded, with the help of note takers, who are supplied by the university to sit with them in class. Popular majors: disability studies, sport management and food studies. Favorite classes: first aid, “Animals and Society” and “Peoples and Cultures of the World.” The students also take a spattering of electives, like hip-hop dance, jewelry-making and photography. For their fourth year, they intern on campus. All the while, they attend workshops — on email etiquette, workplace chitchat and résumé writing — and spend time with student volunteers at trampoline parks, basketball games and pizza parlors. The goal: to become employable.