As understanding of autism increases, so does the number of children diagnosed

Published May 20, 2012, 09:19 AM
Autism — which affects the ability to communicate and interact with others to varying degrees — is a hot topic, with Hollywood celebrities publicizing their children’s diagnoses, and the HBO movie “Temple Grandin” launching its real-life subject onto the national speaking circuit.
By: Jana Hollingsworth, Duluth News Tribune

• Denfeld student

Denfeld junior Jacob Guldner has an after-school job working at an auto-body shop. “I have a very weak social filter,” he said. “I know that it’s wrong; I am inappropriate at the wrong times.” (Clint Austin / caustin@duluthnews.com)

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• Students with autism
• Autism in Duluth school district

When Peg Ferguson started work as an autism teacher for the Duluth school district in the late 1980s, she was one of three who did that work. Today, with a smaller school population overall, there are 12 autism classrooms and teachers from kindergarten through 12th grade.
In 2001, 63 students in the Duluth school district were diagnosed with an autism disorder. This year, there are 162.
“It’s been a steady increase,” said Ferguson, now the district autism resource specialist. “We’ve gotten better at identifying kids.”
Autism — which affects the ability to communicate and interact with others to varying degrees — is a hot topic, with Hollywood celebrities publicizing their children’s diagnoses, and the HBO movie “Temple Grandin” launching its real-life subject onto the national speaking circuit. Grandin spoke in February to a sold-out College of St. Scholastica audience in Duluth.
Still, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention shocked many in March when it came out with data showing the proportion of 8-year-olds in the U.S. with an autism disorder climbing to 1 in 88 children, from 1 in 110 children two years earlier.
“At this point, everyone knows someone with autism,” said Dena Filipovich, who has a second-grader with autism at Laura MacArthur Elementary School. “People are wondering, ‘What is it?’ Which is good, because it means help for children.”
The more people talk about it, said Filipovich, who is treasurer of the Autism Association of Northern Minnesota, the higher the chance that money goes to research to study the various disorders, which have no known cause or cure.
“The research money is not there,” she said. “We’re one of the highest-diagnosed childhood disorders and it’s not getting its fair share of funding because it’s not a fatal disease.”
As diagnoses increase, Ferguson said, so does confusion. That’s why someone like Temple Grandin, an animal science professor at Colorado State University, has been so helpful, she said.
“Temple Grandin is so well-known and articulate,” Ferguson said. “The changes in her have been so neat. People want to hear it first-hand from someone who has gone through it because some can’t articulate it.”
Teachers opened their classroom doors and parents and children shared their experiences with the News Tribune recently with the aim of increasing public understanding of what it means to be autistic, and how it is to teach children at widely varying places on the autism spectrum.