Our Blog Posts

WHAT IS I CAN ONLINE: INSIGHTS FROM AN I CAN MENTOR

WHAT IS I CAN NETWORK: INSIGHTS FROM AN I CAN MENTOR

PIONEERING I CAN NETWORK CELEBRATES 10-YEARS
Australia’s largest Autistic-led organisation, I CAN Network (I CAN®), is celebrating its 10-birthday this October. I CAN is one of the largest employers of Autistic adults with 82 Autistic/ neurodivergent staff located across regional and metropolitan Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland. Staff are trained and deployed to deliver school-based […]

WATERSHED MOMENT FOR VICTORIAN STUDENTS WITH A DISABILITY
The Victorian Government’s recent announcement of its $1.6 billion Disability Inclusion package, which will phase out the Program for Students with Disability funding bucket, is a watershed moment in State education. The Program for Students with Disability has been a restrictive funding model which has required parents to cloak their […]

AN “I CAN PROFILE”: A STUDENT-DRIVEN, STRENGTHS-BASED TOOL
We find that many of our student mentees start our Autistic-led mentoring program with a sense of shame toward being Autistic or being different. Often, they have internalised a deficits-based view of themselves. One of the approaches we’ve used over the years is showing students how to create an “I […]

RESPECTFUL RESOURCES ABOUT AUTISM FOR AUTISTIC YOUNG PEOPLE & THEIR PEERS
As Thomas, a longtime I CAN mentee-now-mentor explains, “The more people who hear positive things about Autism when they are young, the better chance we have of building a world that is inclusive.” It is never too soon to introduce children to respectful representations of Autism and to showcase Autistic […]