Implementation of a multi-family autism transition program in the high school setting.
Transitioning Together succeeds only when schools first shore up family engagement and solid IEP transition goals.
01Research in Context
What this study did
Kuhn et al. (2022) asked 30 Wisconsin high schools to run Transitioning Together. This is a six-week group where families of autistic students meet at school and learn how to plan for life after graduation.
The team tracked which schools finished the course and which dropped out. They also checked if school income, family turnout, and existing transition plans predicted success.
What they found
Only 17 schools (a large share) delivered every session. Winners had three things: higher family turnout, stronger IEP transition pages, and schools in wealthier zip codes.
Bottom line: the program works, but only where families already show up and transition planning is solid.
How this fits with other research
Storch et al. (2012) surveyed the students and found autistic teens almost never lead their own IEP meetings. Jocelyn’s team fills that gap by giving parents the steering wheel.
Gerow et al. (2021) showed telehealth parent coaching boosts daily-living skills in young kids. Jocelyn moves the same idea into high school halls, face-to-face, with a transition twist.
Kirby (2016) proved high parent expectations predict better jobs and independence after school. Jocelyn’s data echo this: schools with engaged parents were the ones that finished the course.
Why it matters
If you coach transition teams, don’t start with curriculum slides. First check family attendance at IEP meetings and the quality of transition goals. Where these are weak, add student-led IEP training and parent orientation nights before you launch Transitioning Together. This front-loaded support can turn a 50-50 shot into a sure bet.
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02At a glance
03Original abstract
Transitioning Together is an intervention that supports families of adolescents on the autism spectrum as they prepare for the transition to adulthood. While it has been delivered successfully and shown to result in positive outcomes for families in the university setting, questions remain about whether and how well it can be widely provided to families in real-world settings such as high schools. In this study, we analyzed predictors, facilitators, and barriers to providing Transitioning Together to families at 30 high schools across three US states, all of which received training from a team of researchers to deliver this intervention. Our findings highlight struggles and successes with real-world use of the intervention. Seventeen of the 30 schools were successful in providing Transitioning Together to families. Schools who had higher community socioeconomic status, higher quality family involvement, and higher quality transition planning programming before changing anything for this study were much more likely to provide this new intervention to families. Schools who used the intervention were mostly able to deliver it as designed and received positive feedback from families who participated. Common parts of the intervention that schools struggled with most included following the structure of the sessions, including group problem-solving and dialogue in the sessions, and collecting feedback from families. Future research is needed to learn how to make it even easier for public high schools and other service systems to provide this intervention to families, in a way that also maximizes its effectiveness and accessibility for historically underserved autism spectrum populations.
Autism : the international journal of research and practice, 2022 · doi:10.1177/13623613211065533