Best Practices for Supporting Neurodivergent Students

Ashley Safranski:

Welcome again everyone. My name’s Ashley Safranski, I lead marketing here at uConnect. I know that we have a lot of new people joining us for a uConnect webinar. So if you’re unfamiliar, uConnect is the creator of the first all-in-one virtual career center. And one of our goals here is to improve access to career and help schools engage with underserved student populations, which is one of the reasons why I’m super excited about today’s conversation and to be joined with our wonderful partners from Mentra who are here to share their point of view and advice for career leaders who are really looking to bolster their support for Neurodivergent students. Jhillika and Conner, thank you so much for joining us. I’m thrilled to have you. I’m going to just turn it over to you and let you introduce yourselves and tell us all a bit about Mentra.

Jhillika Kumar:

For sure. Great to meet everyone here. I’m Jhillika, co-founder and CEO at Mentra. Essentially, we’re building the next LinkedIn for the neurodiverse population, those with autism, ADHD, dyslexia, various forms of cognitive diversity of the human brain. How I was brought into this world, my brother Vikram is a non-speaking or traditionally non-verbal autistic individual. And growing up realized a lot of the biases he faced, navigating not getting the same opportunity to go to school, get a job, get an education like I did. And realized in college doing research that he had everything we were saying. He was highly cognitively intelligent, but just didn’t have the tools and the support system around him to recognize his intelligence.

And so when he had that opportunity, he started to spell on a letterboard and he started to share poetry, and now he’s writing a book and shared his eidetic memory and eagle hearing, and his own exceptional strengths.

And that was the catalyst for starting Mentra, basically to recognizing that one in every seven humans are neurodivergent and systemically under and unemployed. Not because of a lack of skillset or ability, more so because of the hiring systems and processes in place that introduce a lot of bias with this population.

So excited to dive in more, and I will share myself. I’m a neurodivergent and diagnosed with autism and ADHD later in life, and sort of have traversed the journey as a later diagnosed woman and also within Indian family. So there’s all the intersectionality. But really we’re a neurodiverse team. 75% of us are neurodivergent and really bring a lot of passion into what we’re building, and a fire to challenge the status quo. I’ll pass it over to you, Conner.

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah, so excited to meet everyone. My name’s Conner and this all started for me about five years ago at Georgia Tech where Jhillika was sharing the TED Talk and the story of her brother before, which I had never even heard of the term neurodiversity. And as a matter of fact, I didn’t know this at the time, but I actually am autistic myself, diagnosed also as an adult after graduating college at age 24, as many neurodivergents are as we’ll get into.

But essentially, what we’ve worked on for the last five years is creating a platform for companies and for neurodivergent talent to really understand each other in a way that drives ultimate career outcomes. And the short story, ever since Jhillika’s TED Talk, we won a grant from the federal government and from Microsoft right out of school. Jhillika spoke at Grace Hopper in front of a very large audience of corporate employers who saw the need for this, and we were able to actually work at Bank of America on their digital accessibility team, growing an internal employee resource group of neurodivergents internally while building Mentra on the side. And then about two years ago, we actually got investment from Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI to go full-time on building Mentra as a resource for neurodivergent professionals around the country to find those employers that are truly neuroinclusive, and also for us to help those employers really understand the talent pool. So we’re excited to dive into how we can support college students.

Ashley Safranski:

Amazing. Thanks for that introduction Jhillika and Conner, I’m going to jump into our first question here, but again, I always think context is super important. So uConnect and Mentra, why are we partnering? Over the last several years at uConnect, we’ve continued to hear from our partners really of this strong desire to be able to increase the nuanced support for various student populations on their campus, including neurodivergent students. But oftentimes, there’s just a lack of resourcing, or time, or in-house expertise to go find and source resources and content, and different pieces of information.

So we went out and we started to partner with amazing organizations like Mentra, and we’re bringing a lot of the great content that Mentra is providing into our curation kit that is specifically intended to support neurodivergent students. So that is the connection between Mentra and uConnect and our curation kit.

So with that, that’s a lot of getting started. Let’s get into the good stuff. So I think just a good place to start just to kind of set the stage, just to be, some know more than others, just a refresher of, what is neurodiversity? And importantly, what are some of the widespread benefits of cognitive diversity?

Conner Reinhardt:

So neurodiversity is basically the cognitive variation of the human brain, and we can list a long list of conditions such as autism, ADHD, dyslexia, PTSD, dyspraxia, and so many others that kind of fall under the neurodivergence umbrella. But what’s common across all of that is we have different ways of thinking, different ways of approaching situations. From a productivity standpoint, there’s a lot of studies coming out to show that neurodiverse teams in the work setting are actually 30% more productive. And also, there’s very specific cognitive strengths that different neurotypes can bring to the table.

One thing to note is that there are also a lot of important factors to consider around someone’s neurodivergence regardless of their diagnosis and even if they don’t have a diagnosis around the executive functioning, the environmental sensitivities, and the emotional regulation, and many other factors that can really make or break someone’s ability to thrive both in the classroom as well as in a work environment. So that’s really been a core focus of Mentra is understanding that and how these different factors that are going beyond the resume can actually contribute to career outcomes.

Ashley Safranski:

Excellent. Anything to add Jhillika?

Jhillika Kumar:

Yeah, no, I think Conner stated, I think one more to mention is sensory overload when it comes to different environments and sometimes intersectionality is so common as well as different forms of diagnoses. So really when we think about neurodivergence, and we will talk about this a bit more later in terms of do I share, do I share my specific diagnosis? I think really the challenges associated oftentimes is intersectional and universal across many forms. So what Conner mentioned, emotional regulation challenges, executive dysfunctioning, all of those are real and important to consider in both the professional and personal context.

Ashley Safranski:

Yeah, absolutely.

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah. I’ll say one other thing, which is that about 15 to 20% of us are neurodivergent, and not everyone in that group knows, and certainly not everyone will share. So it’s a pretty large population we’re working with.

Ashley Safranski:

Yeah, absolutely. Jhillika, you kind of mentioned some of the challenges. But just to dig in a bit further, maybe you both can expand on some of the unique challenges neurodiverse individuals might face. And I think especially just given the audience, I know we have several higher ed career services professionals, maybe specifically also within a higher ed environment. If you can start there.

Jhillika Kumar:

It’s so interesting, because the working world is oftentimes so incredibly different than the academic context. And sometimes, it’s totally different skill set, and set of rules, and etiquette that come along with the hiring process. And so oftentimes, the tribal knowledge that comes along with everything post after school, the general etiquette is not always easy to understand common sense, and some challenges neurodivergents face can include with emails, making sure they’re following up proactively, with preparing for interviews, with knowing how to give a quick introduction, how to prepare for that, what to wear, what the background might look like. Oftentimes when we talk with recruiters, it’s a fact that backgrounds introduce especially some level of bias when they do influence if someone has a messy versus clean, what does that say? And so even though it’s not intentional, there’s these unconscious biases that recruiters and hiring managers come in with. So that can often be a challenge.

And then even throughout the application process, posting an up-to-date resume in a proper format, making sure individuals are responsive after applying for a job. Sometimes, even email etiquette. Emails might be too short and be interpreted as curt, or emails might be too long and interpreted as verbose. And at that point there can be drop-off in the process.

So a lot of different challenges there, and I think universities and schools have a great opportunity to educate, to help become more job-ready, while also balancing, and I think this is a theme that’ll pop up often is allowing the individual to be self-directed. So coaching them, but making sure that you can enable autonomy, because eventually they’re not going to have that kind of support necessarily at the job, and they’ll need to do it themselves a lot of times. So those are some, it’s important to balance that with giving the skills to make sure the individual can be autonomous and learn the ways of thinking.

I would say another big challenge we see, especially in the university world, is this challenge we call the college-to-couch problem where folks graduate, they get a degree, and then the job-finding process sort of either fills them, or they’re not able to keep a job or sustain a job. And it leads to under unemployment, specifically unemployment.

And so schools can play a really key part there in supporting. And we talk about, we will dive into alumni as well on how to support alumni. But that can be a really big barrier is the sort of inertia that comes with that over time. And then getting back in, and getting the skills, and getting the motivation is a big piece as well.

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah, just to add really quickly, it’s about a 30 to 40% unemployment rate across the entire neurodivergent population. And those rates go up as high as 80% for the autistic population. And that applies even through folks with master’s level education. So nothing to do with the skill set or capability, and everything to do with the various nuance factors Jhillika just mentioned.

Ashley Safranski:

I made a note to dig into the alumni piece later because I think that’s really college-to-couch, I think that’s a really interesting way, and I know a lot of our partners in a lot of centers out there either formally or informally supporting their alumni base, whether it’s a part of their oversight or not.

So I’m going to circle back to that, but I appreciate you chatting, highlighting a lot of the different potential barriers or challenges. And I think you highlighted some of the different ways that career leaders could support or career practitioners on campus. Anything to expand on that?

So knowing that there’s a lot of neurodiverse students, whether they have a diagnosis or not, what are just some general ways that career teams can just generally be more accessible for neurodiverse students?

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah, I can take this one. So I think first and foremost, when it comes to folks like myself who may be neurodivergent, maybe they haven’t fully realized that, there’s a huge population. And even folks who have a diagnosis who have not come forward and shared, there’s a very large portion of the neurodivergent population, we’re still quantifying exactly what that ranges to, that are not going to be coming forward and sharing their unique challenges. And that’s really the whole value proposition of Mentra. Of course, we help folks do that in a job context.

What we found from the job context is that being able to share one’s neurodivergent is a critical prerequisite to finding long-term success in a career. So that starts with the career center. We need to make sure that the students that have various sensitivities or cognitive strengths that go deeper than the typical process, or resume, or that vary beyond what the standard support may provide, that those students have the platform to share that.

And typically what we’ve seen is that when the accommodations office and disability office on campus are footnotes on the brochure, that very few students end up leveraging those resources. However, when those resources are put front and center for the entire student body, that rate can go up a lot. And that’s really for two reasons.

Number one, a lot of folks that may not obviously consider themselves neurodivergent might recognize or resonate with some of the supports or challenges and start to even take advantage of resources, perhaps even without a diagnosis, or certainly without feeling like this is something they would’ve done intentionally otherwise.

And secondly, it creates a validation that removes some of the fear behind what we call unmasking. Whereas if we can show that employers are actually hiring folks, not despite their neurodivergence, but because of it, we have seen in certain career paths how various neurotypes can be incredible strengths. Then that shows the students that this is not something that is going to hurt them, but rather something that’s an essential part of who they are, something that they have to recognize and contend with, bring forth in how they both navigate their professional career in academia, but also even in the workforce. And as a career center, it’s our job to make sure that those students have the platform to be fully understood.

Ashley Safranski:

There’s a question, and you might feel like I’m asking the same question in several different ways, but a question in the box that came up is I think for a lot of career advisors or career coaches who are meeting with students even one-on-one on a day-to-day basis, any advice for those individuals when they’re coaching neurodiverse students in a one-to-one fashion? I know that’s a very broad, general question, but if you can put yourself in that scenario, just any best practices or guidance I think would be really helpful.

Jhillika Kumar:

Yeah, I would say a big one is creating a safe space for neurodivergence to disclose. Sometimes, it’s really important for the job seeker to advocate on behalf of themselves. So one example is we highly recommend putting the accommodations in the section where you’re scheduling availability. So let’s say you get an interview request from a recruiter and you say, okay, the response from the job seeker could be, I could respond from X to Y. “I’m available from X to Y time. FYI, some of my adjustments or accommodations during the interview are as follows,” requiring extra processing time, recognizing the need for a fidgeting device or lack of eye contact if I’m looking at the device, making that clear upfront.

And oftentimes, what we encourage on the other side is for recruiters to provide a forum in the e-mails to say, “Thanks, is there any other support or accommodations we can provide?” But not everyone asks that.

So it’s really important for the job seeker to advocate for themselves, especially because if that’s not done, the consequences, someone might show up and take extra time to process and answer a question. And then there’s sort of this unknown unknown where the hiring manager’s like, “Okay, do I say something now? What’s happening? Why are they moving around the camera screen?”

So just to avoid that awkwardness, it actually doesn’t increase bias. It removes a lot of bias, because it takes the shock factor and those discriminatory factors out of the interview. And that way, the interviewer can focus on skill sets while taking merits of the individual. So those would be some tangible tips that could be really helpful. And teaching the job seeker to advocate for themselves is really important.

Ashley Safranski:

Conner, anything to add before I move on?

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah, I think companies often ask us, they say, “Well, if we know which folks are neurodivergent, doesn’t that introduce subconscious bias?” And quite frankly the answer is the opposite. Because if you don’t know that someone’s neurodivergent, and they act differently in certain ways, maybe there’s no eye contact or the communication is different, then we’re going to subconsciously roll those folks out because of their differences. Whereas if your recruiter, for example, is briefed on the fact that, “Hey, Conner’s coming into an interview, he may not have eye contact, but he’s good for the role in these other ways,” then that can sort of disarm some of those biases and focus on the objective capabilities.

And specifically, we always recommend when I’m working with folks one-on-one sandwiching both the cognitive strengths, the neuroexceptional strengths alongside someone’s sensitivities because there always are strengths, even if they’re not obvious. So working with those folks to help them articulate how their neurodivergence can help them. And that could be from resilience or empathy among many other things, hyper-focus, attention to detail. So it really varies, but articulating that’s really important.

Jhillika Kumar:

Exactly. And how that contributes to a very specific job function and allows them to perform that and excel at that.

Ashley Safranski:

Yeah, I think just because we’re on the topic of employers, and interviews, and whatnot, I want to jump ahead to a question I have here on my notes. Can you share some advice or guidance around how career centers or folks who are working with employers, how they can partner with and educate their career or their employer partners when it comes to recruiting and hiring neurodiverse students? And Jhillika, I do have your one page or two if you wanted just… Now I know you’re not at your computer, so I’m happy to share anything that you’d like.

Jhillika Kumar:

Sure, yeah. Yeah, I think the curation kit is going to be really awesome to sort of have those different types of curated content for neurodivergence tailored to the university context. Yeah, I think if you’d like to share, that’s a great example of one of the supports and one-pagers we provide basically to share what to expect walking into an interview, so that’s one piece.

Yes. So how to educate employers on hiring neurodivergent students. For example, looking at skills, looking at behavioral differences, communication differences, different processing times, and anxiety sometimes might influence the way someone responds to a question, but not letting that affect the evaluation of skills, discomfort around disclosure. So yeah, we’re putting out active resources based on what we’re learning because we’re talking with these companies every day and trying to understand how to improve hiring outcomes. So that’s one resource and we’ll share it with you right after as well, as part of the email follow up.

But yeah, I mean just to your question, I think every single neurodivergent, they say if you met a neurodivergent, you met one neurodivergent. And everyone is different and needs different support.

And one of our biggest challenges is folks don’t know where to go. There’s a lot out there. And most of that information, or a lot of it is sometimes redundant or outdated. And hopefully by partnering with your team, we can point students in the right direction to really be self-sufficient and know, “This is where I go to get this type of access to resources.” So hopefully that will be helpful in furthering career outcomes, because there’s great talent out there that is going overlooked.

Ashley Safranski:

Anything else Conner?

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah, maybe just to summarize, the responsibility is twofold. Number one, as career centers to be able to make sure every company that’s coming onto campus has some general awareness that 20% of your student body is neurodivergent, and here’s some things that should be applied across the board. And then also on the student side, it is up to the individual student to share their own individual neurodivergent. So working one-on-one, working with those students to help them articulate that. So creating that safe space and then having the students kind of share their own story.

Ashley Safranski:

Any suggestions for… This is a question that came in the chat and I think again, is very on topic. Any suggestions for helping students identify neurodivergent-friendly companies or how to assess companies?

Jhillika Kumar:

Yes. Great question. That’s exactly the purpose of Mentra is to identify what are those companies and what are the elements of those organizations that make them neuroinclusive. For example, making sure managers have… We have the four metrics of metrics of neuroinclusive manager styles that we’ve developed in our five-step guide, which we can share as well after this. But basically, making sure employers are walking the walk with those five steps all the way from getting the right managers, getting the right recruiters that are the entry point into the organization and making sure there’s no bias at that entryway, all the way to building a support infrastructure where there’s mentorship, employee resource groups. So that end-to-end piece is something that we work with companies to either develop or to assess. So we help with the assessment.

And then when it comes to training, we have a whole plethora of partners that we work with that provide that additional training. And based on where the gaps are from the assessment, go in and work with those divisions or teams to train them on what is neurodiversity, and what are the benefits, and what are the support needs. So that’s a great question, and that’s exactly where we hope to make an impact.

Ashley Safranski:

We teed it up for you. That was perfect. Great. Anything to add, Conner?

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah, I think it really comes down to… It varies a lot even within companies, and we’re seeing a lot of folks who are starting to unmask in companies today. So ERGs are forming, neurodiversity ERGs. And we are working at Mentra very closely with these ERGs to help make sure that those values and supports are able to extend throughout the hiring process. But certainly asking about the resources and what is it like being a neurodivergent on the inside and what sorts of ERGs are available is always a good question to ask.

Ashley Safranski:

There’s a question in the Q&A. Again, I’m trying to keep everything as related as I can. I’m just going to read it. “Our center has been navigating AI as a career tool. AI is problematic because of the race and gender biases inherent in the data. Does the data show AI also include bias toward neurotypical?” And I know Mentra leverages AI, so any commentary there?

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah, I can just quickly chime in on that one. So that’s a really important point, and I think AI is as good as the data that is trained on. For Mentra just to clarify, we have a very robust matching algorithm that looks at the holistic factors behind an individual, that today we are not using AI in the actual matches, specifically because explainability is really important and we need to understand as we’re building the system about, how it can be truly fair for all forms of neurodivergents.

I would say that probably the most detrimental portion of this is in this the screening step. A lot of traditional AI screening tools in applicant tracking systems and resume screening tools can filter out folks who may have experiences that look a little bit different than the normal, which is if you think about folks who are outside of the normal, that’s mostly neurodiversion and non-linear career path folks. And really that’s the core focus of how we are building our platform differently is focusing on work samples, focusing on boot camps, and projects that may have existed outside of the classroom.

So it is a challenging battle to game the system. And one thing we’ve seen well from some of our boot camp partners, just being able to actually in a resume, take work samples and basically format them as if they were work experiences. So if you’ve done three projects as part of your computer science class, formatting those in the resume as if there were three different work experience items and just trying to make sure that the skills and the layout of the resume is the same. But certainly these are systems that are challenging and we’re trying to create an alternative.

Jhillika Kumar:

Yeah, or even outside of class. A lot of hiring managers we’ve talked to really index on, how much did this individual go above and beyond to work on this side project, and how long did they pursue that for, and what was the traction there? And especially with the typical engineering and data careers, having a GitHub and seeing those in action, or data visualization projects. Or even for design roles, looking at portfolios. That doesn’t leverage AI, that’s the human.

And we actually do see a lot of opportunity for AI to make it easier for job seekers. For example, when writing emails or getting advice, and we’ve built a virtual job coach named Nero. But that I think there’s an opportunity to kind of provide the student with that booster pack and then not leverage it for the part that could cause bias and discrimination.

Conner Reinhardt:

That is an important emphasis point is that there’s a lot of personalization that can be beneficial from AI to make sure that folks can truly express themselves and get the feedback that oftentimes may be missed in a human context.

Ashley Safranski:

I want to circle back to the college-to-couch notion that we talked about earlier. I’ve mentioned to both of you Conner and Jhillika around how some career offices have alumni support as part of their purview, supporting their alumni with career development or exploration. And some don’t, but they still have alumni reaching out.

And I’ll back up and say, I think an important piece of context with serving alumni is they often can’t walk into your office. So wanting to make sure that if you are serving them, that you’re providing them with accessible information and resources. So any best practices or just general advice to career teams who are serving an alumni base?

Jhillika Kumar:

Yeah, totally. I think with alumni, so much of it is tracking the data and not losing touch after someone graduates, having systems and mechanisms to do that proactive reach out. Maybe they’re not looking for internships, but if full-time opportunities come your way, there’s a lot of cool tools out there and automations that can help with targeting mailing lists and things.

And then, a lot of times it’s really about not being intimidated by the hiring process just because it’s not been working for this individual for so long. Oftentimes, what we see is if folks don’t get employment, there’s typically a few areas of improvement that can help get them to job readiness. And sometimes, it’s just having that direct feedback and that mentor that’s just going to say it straight, and give that honest feedback. And providing that to someone, whether it’s in a written format or even giving it to them directly, I think is really critical to allow them to improve.

And I think schools stand in a great position to do that, especially when it comes to minor things they could change. A great tip, for example, I give is sometimes I tend to over talk as an ADHDer. Many of us do as neurodivergents, and a tip I share is, if you’re talking a lot, just say, “I’ll pause there,” in an interview. And just take a moment. If you feel anxious or you feel like they’ve lost attention, just say, “I’ll pause there,” and let the conversation flow to what the recruiter wants.

And we’ve heard from several job seekers that that feedback has been a make or break for them in the interview. And then also to have a strong support system. So I think analysis paralysis or ruminating on, where did I go wrong, what did I do? Is it my fault? Maybe it’s just a fact, location within the line, and now the individual is questioning their entire value, and identity, and skillset.

So if there is awareness of what those feedback or improvement areas are or if there’s a relationship built with the employer that you can get that feedback and share, I think there’s great opportunity for improvement and that strengths first approach that’s key to all of this is focusing on where can the individual bring value, what are the differences, and how can that contribute to the organization?

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah. And you might be surprised that a lot of the folks coming to Mentra have applied to hundreds of applications or some folks may not be so surprised. And many of them have kind of been out of school and not been able to land that first job. So I would definitely encourage your teams if you are tracking alumni groups, that neurodivergent resources in particular are going to be valuable there. If we look at the 40% unemployment rate, that is going to be disproportionately intersectional to that group.

So that’s where we’ve seen folks finding a lot of value from coming to Mentra. So from the schools that we’ve been working with, a lot of the folks we’ve actually ended up getting placed are those folks have been out of school for one, two, three years, and really just needed that neuro-inclusive environment to be able to get that entry point, at which point now they’re able to progress. So definitely something to look into.

Ashley Safranski:

Just quickly, I’ve mentioned curation kits, and I feel like this is just a good moment to highlight the neurodivergent kit, is just a way we know when you can’t meet with students in a one-to-one capacity, I teed it up for myself I suppose here. But I did just want to highlight that I think there’s a great and many opportunities to support neurodivergent students with the self-guided resources.

So I wanted to highlight here some of the content that we’re getting from Mentra. So this is a part of the curation kit. So I won’t share long, but making this accessible and readily available to folks who can’t come raise their hand or come walk into your office, I think is another important reminder.

We are getting close to Q&A. So I just have a couple of ones before we dig into the several questions in the chat and in the Q&A box. What are some things that career teams should avoid as they work with neurodiverse students?

Jhillika Kumar:

Great question. I think this ties back in a little bit with the intro that I shared about my brother, and sometimes that happens very often with neurodivergence, especially in the younger age groups, is this idea of making sure… What not to do would be I think infantilization or not pursuing competence. So I think the goal when working with neurodivergents and really anyone is to assume that the individual has the competence unless proven otherwise. And then recalibrating.

Oftentimes because we’re often naïve, or come in with a sense of purity, or even just a lack of knowledge of the real world, it’s easy to jump in and support almost like a parent would instinctually. And it’s so important, what to do is to prepare students for autonomy, allow them to make decisions for themselves. And then when it comes to jobs in particular, really presenting as many opportunities as possible. And maybe helping steer with how their skills might align with certain types of jobs and staying up to date on that. And we have a jobs page where folks can stay up to date with a lot of those neuro-inclusive opportunities. But really, not necessarily limiting the opportunities just because of an assumption. More so presenting what an individual might be good at, all types of opportunities, and making that accessible and available. So I think that would be the not to do piece and the to do piece kind of mixed in there.

Conner Reinhardt:

Absolutely. Yeah, I think also there’s very good points. I would avoid withholding candid feedback. And of course this is an individual case-by-case situation, so recognizing the importance of judgment. I think there’s a lot of neurodivergent folks who don’t get the direct feedback that we need to improve, and as a result, we continue to struggle over and over again without a proper diagnosis of what exactly we could do differently.

So I think being able… And most of the time this is because a lot of folks are being too nice in the sense that there’s no incentive for anyone to give us direct feedback that we really need to hear. That’s very difficult to hear sometimes.

So I think a career center, and the role that career centers play are one of the very few entities that a neurodivergent professional might go through that actually is in that position to give the candid feedback that might be difficult to understand and swallow. But I think it’s also very important and it will tangibly impact folks in the right way if delivered with taste.

Ashley Safranski:

I love that, well said. Before we transition to the Q&A, any just off the cuff, maybe just a couple of quick immediate strategies or initiatives that career teams could implement to just immediately start increasing support or access to career resources for their neurodiverse student population?

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah, for sure. I mean, one thing is for folks who are interested in working more with Mentra, we do a lot to bring neuroinclusive opportunities onto our platform to help neurodivergent job seekers basically create holistic profiles. So from a job seeker point of view, they can sign up, it’s about 30 minutes. And that really is a great tool whether they use Mentra or not to actually find a job. The Mentra profile is a standardized way of articulating someone’s accommodations, their environmental sensitivities, their cognitive strengths.

So sending people through that process and reviewing their Mentra profile for example, adds almost a framework for how they can have a talk track to advocate for themselves is one thing that could be helpful. Certainly, we have other ways to engage. So after this event, if anyone is interested, we are happy to follow up more individually because it does vary school to school. Anything else you’d add?

Jhillika Kumar:

No, I think you covered it. Yeah, we can share a link after. And if there are neurodivergent students that you interface with that are looking for those neuroinclusive companies, we do email blasts and share that out, so you can forward the opportunities along. So more than happy to share a link after the webinar, which will come along with the kits, to share how to get engaged and sort of join that forum to share and spread opportunities with students.

Ashley Safranski:

Yeah, absolutely.

Conner Reinhardt:

Last thing I would say is talk openly about neurodivergence to all students whether or not you may make the assumption that they are a neurodivergent, and that gives everyone the chance to see if there may be their own challenges that maybe are hidden from view in the typical career center conversation might be worth bringing up. So you got to kind of create the space for that to happen, I would say.

Ashley Safranski:

Yeah, absolutely. And we will definitely in our follow-up with the recording and other resources, we’ll provide some more information or ways that everyone can connect with the Mentra team. So related Conner and Jhillika, really quick, there was a question about, is Mentra a free resource for all students and alumni?

Conner Reinhardt:

All jobs seekers. Employers subscribe, everything else is free.

Ashley Safranski:

Yeah, awesome. And I’m just going through. They may not be connected, so we’re going to keep you on your toes Jhillika and Conner with [inaudible 00:39:23]. So first question, “How do we introduce neurodiversity to students who may not be aware of the concept and/or how it’s showing up in their lives?”

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah, I think I’ll take a stab at that. I think first of all, explaining that about 15 to 20% of the world population is neurodivergent and that companies are starting to see the value of hiring from this population. And maybe you can certainly list some of the conditions, autism, ADHD, dyslexia, and others. But most likely, the most resonant portion is going to be if there’s any sort of environmental sensitivities, whether it’s bright lights or loud sounds, any sort of accommodations, or unique ways that your brain operates. Attention to detail, hyper-focus, pattern recognition among other things, being able to articulate and share those in the career context is important. It actually could be very essential to your success.

So breaking it out in that context, even if we don’t talk about conditions, even if we don’t talk about the terminology, asking folks, “Do you have any sensitivities? Do you have any unique strengths that may not come across in a typical career conversation? Let’s talk about those. Let’s unearth those.” And then in the role as a career center, that’s a good starting point to understand and how that student can best be supported.

Jhillika Kumar:

Yeah. And a question to ask there could be, what is your connection to neurodiversity or the disabilities community? And folks might share they have family members, they might share they’re a self-advocate themselves. So kind of understanding the connection can be helpful there as a question to ask, because I know that’s sometimes awkward even for teammates on our team. It’s often hard to ask directly, but understanding that connection could be a great way to have someone open up about it, and creating a safe space where they feel comfortable enough to share is important too.

Ashley Safranski:

Absolutely. All really great suggestions. This was a question that came, I think when I asked my first question about what are the different, describe neurodivergency. And the question is, would mood disorders like bipolar, depression, or anxiety disorders be considered neurodivergent too?

Conner Reinhardt:

Yes, absolutely.

Ashley Safranski:

Some say yes, but some say no, and any clarity would be helpful.

Jhillika Kumar:

Yeah. Yeah, I’m happy to share. I think a lot of times, we’ve seen the challenge of mental health challenges arise when neurodivergents don’t get the support they need. And oftentimes, for example, autism is commonly misdiagnosed with bipolar disorder. So there is a lot of overlap in synergy, and so we do consider them under the same umbrella because it could be a form of the environment not providing the support needed to nurture the individual that then could result in depression, or anxiety, or mental health conditions. So it’s 100% there’s a lot of overlap there, and the answer is yes.

Conner Reinhardt:

And I’ll just share from a personal standpoint, well, first of all, from Mentra, we have a very broad definition and we do support self-diagnosed individuals even if they don’t have formal diagnosis. Because I’ll share from my example, I did not know I was autistic until after working in multiple internships where I was able to thrive without any issues. There was no reason for me to even think about this.

However, when I worked in a different context, I started to develop extreme anxiety to the point of having mental health issues that prohibited me from even being able to work effectively in some cases. So that actually drove me personally to therapy, not something my employer would’ve known about. But that therapist recommended that I then seek a screening assessment because she thought that I may be exhibiting autistic tendencies.

And after getting through a very expensive and long diagnosis process that paid for out of pocket, I was able to actually get the clarity that these conditions were the result of my neurodivergence not being articulated or understood in my employment context.

So all that is to say, we’re not going to require to send people through therapy, through months and sometimes years waiting, and through thousands of dollars out of pocket to get the clarity that they need to find the support that they need to really do well. That’s not a fair expectation from our perspective for society, and that’s our goal is to make sure that these resources can be accessible.

Ashley Safranski:

Really helpful. Thank you for expanding on that. Next question in here. When employers talk about DEI, they struggle to bring up neurodiversity. How do we engage employers to speak about the ways in which they embrace neurodiversity within their company?

Conner Reinhardt:

Very good question. One thing we’ve noticed working with 44,000 job seekers, neurodivergent professionals, is that it’s a very, very diverse group of folks that we are working with. So I think from a DEI context, every form of traditional diversity also overlaps with neurodiversity. And we’ve seen over-representation of women, people of color, and other minority groups on the platform, including a huge over-representation of LGBTQ community members as well.

That said, our main focus when we go to employers, and our primary messaging is that this is not a DEI initiative. Working to hire the neurodivergent population is an ROI initiative because it’s allowing you to improve your employee retention and your productivity by really understanding what makes or breaks a job fit.

And we do have certain characteristics that are not considered in the resume review, in traditional interviewing, that are very important things to assess for when determining what makes a great software engineer, what makes a great designer, and in so many other roles as well. And if today’s hiring systems aren’t able to recognize those characteristics, then companies ultimately foot the bill.

So I would entirely focus it on finding the right talent, making sure that you’re not missing out on top talent, and making sure you’re able to set up the talent that you do bring in from the campus level for long-term success in your organization without having them leave.

Jhillika Kumar:

Exactly. Yeah. This statement we use often is it’s more than DEI. It’s ROI. There’s true value in bringing diverse minds to your team, and a big one being that you’re representing the population you serve within your employee base. So you’re designing products that represent everyone. So encourage everyone. That mindset shift is important too.

Conner Reinhardt:

Return on investment, sorry we use corporate lingo. ROI equals return on investment.

Jhillika Kumar:

Exactly. So brings business benefits as well.

Ashley Safranski:

Yeah, I think that’s really well said. Next question in here. Let’s see, we’re at eight minutes. When would it be appropriate for neurodivergent students to disclose about their neurodivergence if the employer does not offer space for it? Should it be during an interview, cover letter, so on?

Conner Reinhardt:

You me to answer?

Jhillika Kumar:

Yeah, go for it.

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah. So it’s a tough question. I think it always comes down to individual judgment. There are multiple schools of thought here. Generally, my personal school of thought and one we’ve seen most successful is that sharing early on in the process is better for multiple reasons. There will be jobs that fundamentally an individual will lose out on. But generally speaking, those are jobs that would’ve ended with a poor outcome anyway. So getting that information out front is almost like a screener just as much for the candidate as it is for a company. And it’s one archaic way of determining whether a company is neuroinclusive.

Another important aspect is, for example, if you’re meeting with a recruiter, being able to share ahead of time, “Hey, I am neurodivergent and I think that makes me great for the role in these ways. And by the way, if you want to learn more before we meet, here’s my Mentra profile.” That’s something we’ve seen can be effective, or even just in the Mentra profile itself, it doesn’t actually say that you’re neurodivergent. It’s just it could be referenced as a portfolio. It just so happens to include some of the-

Jhillika Kumar:

Inclusion-

Conner Reinhardt:

Inclusion essential, so it’s kind of a low touch way of sharing that, and that’s kind of the main purpose behind it. Another thing to mention here is that it’s important always, I would say, to recognize and position neurodivergence as a strength in the context of the role. And that gives you permission to do so earlier in the process.

For example, in the cover letter, I’m applying to this role because as an autistic individual, I have exceptional pattern recognition that I think would be perfectly applicable for this. And in fact, I’ve done this on my own. I’ve created my own video game, whatever the story is. And then just as a footnote, being autistic, you might want to know that I might not present myself the same way, but I can still do-

Jhillika Kumar:

Get the job done.

Conner Reinhardt:

Really well. So I would lead with strengths first, which is why it’s important to work with your students to help articulate those strengths. And the last thing I would say is it’s important to not be… We’ve actually gotten this feedback from employers. Even for the neuroinclusive companies out there, if folks are asking for 40 or 50 accommodations right out of the gate in a pretty demanding way, that is not the right approach. So I would say definitely being tasteful with what are you requesting, how are you requesting it, and when are you requesting it? Just so that the employer is able to reasonably accommodate without putting too much burden on them would be another thing to note.

Jhillika Kumar:

Yeah. And when reaching out to schedule the interview, for example, and setting times, that’s a great opportunity as well.

Ashley Safranski:

Amazing advice. So many great little nuggets in there. Next one I’ll read. “I am a Gen X neurodiverse person, so I had no idea about any of this until I entered my late forties. Our generation just had to make do and do our best. But looking back, I can see how my own career was impacted by now knowing. What is some advice you would give student”… Let’s see, sorry. “Would you give someone who is neurodiverse when working with younger neurodiverse students?”

Conner Reinhardt:

Share your story, I think is the most important thing. I think, for example, if I was a student before I had my diagnosis and I had [inaudible 00:50:09] folks who were successful in their careers or had a lot of experience who were actually able to say, “Here’s some of the struggles I had behind the scenes, but also here’s how my unique mind made me well positioned to succeed.” I think the more stories and the more variety of stories can be shared, the more of a chance there is for that person to identify that within themselves, and then therefore go down the path they need to articulate it.

Jhillika Kumar:

Exactly. Yeah. I mean, it’s so rare to find examples. I think it’s such a… Thank you for sharing first of all, your learning of your own diagnosis later in life. Sharing the challenges I think is important, because sometimes we want to understand what folks have overcome and how we can relate to that and overcome our own challenges.

So being vulnerable I think is really important, and that allows us to kind of take that mask off, and to show up as we are, and creates a sense of relatability, especially if it’s in a context where you’re a teacher or a professor, and opening up about that, and your connection to the cause, and what brings you here I think encourages others to share as well. And that’s why we share too, because hopefully in us sharing, it can encourage others to also be vulnerable and authentic. So second what he said.

Ashley Safranski:

Really well said once again. I think one of the last questions we might have time for here. I’ll just rattle off, and let’s see. There are still a lot of bias and prejudice towards neurodivergent people. In higher education, they often are accommodated through the disability-related structures that only reinforces stereotypes associated with it. Given the diversity what constitutes neurodiversity, what is the best way to help those students who are still cautious about self-reporting their needs?

Jhillika Kumar:

Yeah. And I think just to clarify, when we talk about disability and neurodiversity, there’s a lot of gray area there. And our overview of how we interpret it and what could be helpful to share with students is that oftentimes with disabilities, there’s visible disabilities like motor impairments, visual, hearing, and then there’s also the invisible. And those are oftentimes neurological. And then as we stated, it could be emotional, sensory related. So having that context that sometimes it’s something someone might be experiencing on the inside, even if we’re sitting right beside them, we might have no idea is always important.

Conner Reinhardt:

Yeah. I’ll say one thing which I think is important. Not every neurodivergent is going to identify as having a disability. And the reason why is because… And that could even vary at different points in someone’s life. The reason why is because it depends on the environment.

So if someone is neurodivergent and they are in a non-neuroinclusive environment, that could absolutely be presented as a disability. If someone’s neurodivergent and they’re an environment that is actually able to recognize their strengths and provide the support they need, they can thrive in such a way that may never come across as a disability. So it’s very contextual. I would say that sending folks to the disability office for all neurodivergents is not the right approach for one reason and one reason only is that very, very, very few neurodivergents go there. Fundamentally, most of the folks that find Mentra did not come through the disability office and have not shared their neurodivergence through that channel. So I think that fundamentally, the career center has a wider reach, and therefore a responsibility to help folks recognize and articulate their own unique way of thinking, environmental sensitivities, and of course cognitive strengths. Because folks do then after college, land in an environment where that’s now their first time really experiencing challenges behind the scenes.

Ashley Safranski:

We are officially, we’ve reached an hour. Jhillika and Conner, I just want to thank you once again, so very much for joining us today. There were several comments in the chat. I’m not sure if you had a chance to see, but lots of compliments to you both as gifted presenters and just a lot of incredible knowledge and advice shared.

So thank you so much to you both for sharing your time, and your knowledge, and your expertise, and just kudos to you both and the work of the entire Mentra team for what you’re doing to support neurodiverse job seekers all over. Really just admirable, and we are grateful to be partners with you all.

So appreciate it. I hope everyone has a wonderful rest of their week and tune back soon for our next webinar as part of the series. So more to come. And yes, recording will come tomorrow. Lots of resources as follow up, ways to connect with the Mentra team, and so on. So thanks again everyone.

Conner Reinhardt:

Thank you all so much. Thank you for hosting us and for the delightful discussion.

Jhillika Kumar:

Yeah, thanks Ashley. And thanks everyone for joining and tuning in.