 Over three and a half million Americans live with autism. Over one percent of the world's population is on the autism spectrum. Prevalence in the United States is estimated at one in 68 births. What is autism? We spoke with some random people and asked them if they knew what autism was. Very little. My awareness is very shallow on that subject. It is a condition that affects the brain. I know it's an organic disorder. I know it's a mental disorder that affects a lot of people and more than it's known, I think. I think a lot of very, very smart people are autistic. It can be hereditary or it can be from outside causes like vaccinations or possibly traumatic life experiences. It's like a condition of the brain. I know that it affects their learning capabilities or the way that they learn. There's different spectrums of autism and there's different ranges but I'm not 100% sure what those are. It's a lack of emotions, I guess, right? I know none. I know nothing about autism. I know nothing about autism, nothing. What is autism? Many people have an idea of what autism is, that it affects the brain or that it can impair verbal or nonverbal communications. Autism can be a real mystery and to most people, autism is one big puzzle. For instance, over 1% of the world's population has been diagnosed with autism. Boys are nearly five times more likely than girls to have autism with one in 42 boys getting the disorder. At this time, there is no complete medical diagnosis or cure for autism and the causes still elude us. What we're going to do is help give people an idea of what autism is and add one more piece to the puzzle that is autism. As we reach out to the community, we interview a few qualified professionals and ask them some basic questions on how they work on a daily basis with children with autism. As a speech-language pathologist, my job is to assess the students. When they first come to school, usually they either have an evaluation or they need an evaluation to prove that they have a delay in either language or speech. And then from there, we come up with goals and objectives that we want to work on for a year along with the parents. And we form a team here because we're in a public school system. The team consists of a teacher, the parents, the speech therapist and if the child gets occupational therapy as well, that person would be involved. My experience with children with autism comes from being a parent of a child with autism as well as having taught children with autism for the past nine years. And so I can say that definitely children with autism are very unique and they're very complex. As far as working with children with autism as compared to children without autism, I found when I started with kids with autism 14 years ago that the methods I had to use were different. And I worked with a lot of younger kids back when I first started and then I do right now. And it's very much a cause and effect means of learning or a first this, then this. The techniques I had to use were different even though the kinds of things I was teaching were the same. The prevalence of autism has increased dramatically in the last four decades. In 1975, the diagnosis rate was one in every 5,000 infants. In 1995, it increased tenfold to one in every 500. One in every 250 in 2001, 150 in 2007. And now in 2015, the rate is one in every 64 children have been diagnosed with autism. I think we have a lot of students who get misdiagnosed and maybe have a language or a sensory disorder. It could be a mental health issue and because they have certain behaviors they get labeled as autism. While there may be no direct care for autism, there are several forms of treatment for certain symptoms. There are speech pathologists who help enhance the social communication development for children with autism and play a major role in diagnosing people with autism. There are also occupational therapists who can help develop five motor skills and improve daily living skills such as learning how to focus on task or expressing feelings in a more appropriate way. Behavior analysts perform an important part of undermining certain symptoms or repetitive behaviors by using positive reinforcement and other psychological skills. The behavior analysts also helps form a plan for the person with autism to help them lead a more social life. We had the opportunity to dig deeper into the treatment for autism by sitting down with Tamila Gibbons, a board-certified behavior analyst. Well, what I do is all based on the science of applied behavior analysis so there's lots of different procedures that we use. It just depends on the outcome of the assessment that is particular to someone's problem behavior. We found a local play being shown at the Florida Studio Theater in Sarasota called Dancing Lessons. The play revolves around a professor with autism. We have a much deeper understanding of what the spectrum is, how it works, how to assist people, how to help them translate and be understood by people without autism. And so when plays like this come out, when movies like this come out, what I think they're doing is one, they are reflecting where our society is in their understanding and two, they are helping that society move forward in the way we grapple with the questions. We still don't know what causes autism. So by portraying it in ways that are accessible, film, TV, plays, not everyone can go to a classroom or go and deal directly with someone with autism. So the opportunity to interact with them this way, to take the story home with them, it helps everyone's understanding of it expand. And so I think if I was going to impart something to your video, to talk to the community about is that we really need to be looking at some models that are from other states such as up north as to how to start bringing them down here because our transition programs, our young adult programs and adult programs for people with autism are fairly non-existent in this area. And like I said, we have a large population of children, so right now they have a place to go during the day because they go to school obviously, but the options for what's going to be appropriate and the meaningful next step in their life are really missing. My interest was really raised when I met a young man, probably 17 years old now, who I had known when he was five or six years old. And he has autism. At that point he was very non-verbal. He was unable to physically shake hands. He really tuned out people around him. And when I saw him on the street, he was able to give a big hug, was very, very friendly. He was a smart kid all along, but it was so nice to have a conversation with him. And that kind of a change because of the education and socialization his parents had made sure that he got just amazed me so much. I was interested in the topic. The number one thing I think that's different for families that have children that are affected pretty severely is the level of supervision that's required. And so that means that sometimes when they're sleeping, somebody has to be sleeping near them. That may mean that a caregiver is sleeping on the couch every night or on the floor in the child's bedroom to make sure that they're safe. So they're not sleeping. I just think that it's important for people to know that students with autism or children and adults with autism are loving and kind and want to be with people and want to be part of a relationship. Children with autism are just that. They're children first and autistic second.