Marquette community members will come together in recognition of Autism Awareness Month to discuss autism along with other intellectual and developmental disabilities at 7 p.m., Thursday, April 5 in Jamrich room 1100.

Seton Trost, a junior biology major with a concentration in zoology, is the president of NMU’s “Best Buddies” club, one of the groups sponsoring the event.

“The autism awareness panel is meant to bring awareness to campus for a group that is not normally represented. It’s sponsored by the NMU finance committee, Goodwill of Marquette and NMU Best Buddies.” Trost said “I think it’s important to have these discussions because it’s becoming more and more prevalent in our society, and I think they’re discussions that a lot of people shy away from. They are people too, and I think it definitely needs to be talked about.”

Attending this discussion may be a learning opportunity for those who would like to learn or understand more about autism and disabilities, Trost said.

“I think this will be a learning opportunity because they’ll not only see presentations on it, but ask questions about stuff that they’ve wanted to ask about, things that they’re curious about or maybe wanted to learn without going through the internet,” Trost said.

Trost said with the event quickly approaching the NMU Best Buddies Club is excited to share the event with NMU and the community.

“We’re excited just to see how many people come out for it. This is our first main event as a club. We’re a newer club on campus, so we just want to see how far of an outreach we have right now,” Trost said.

The event will include presentations from two speakers who look to speak about how those with autism function with daily activities and autism within the workplace.

NMU Coordinator of Disability Services Jennifer Gorton will be a panelist for the
event.

“For this panel, I am representing services that are provided for students here at Northern. We all come from different backgrounds so I’m excited about this. We all have some very general talking points, but I’m hoping that there will be a lot of audience participation that’s going to ask us questions, that’s kind of why we’re here to start a discussion,” Gorton said.

The discussion will take place on Thursday, April 5 from 7 to 9 p.m. in Jamrich 1100.