Autism Goes To College website

The award-winning documentary film Autism Goes To College follows producer Erik Linthorst’s earlier documentary film, Autistic-Like, Graham’s Story, which reached 80 million homes in over 40 countries. His work recognized the blurry lines and complicated issues surrounding the raising of a child with Autistic Spectrum Disorder, back in 2011. So, what happens now, when that child is all grown up, ready for the next step, and must advocate for themself?

Meet Guillermo, Jasmine, Caroline, Jonathan and Aniella—five students on the spectrum who take us on campus, and into their lives, to see how they’re doing college! The Autism Goes To College website takes clips from the film, blogs from contributors, and podcast episodes; sharing real-life student, parent, and faculty stories, and offering guidance. New stories are added regularly, and plans for the next version of the site will involve user testing, content, and development by autistic students themselves.

I created all the branding and promotion for the film, which premiered in 2019. With this resource website project, I got to expand on this visual system by dealing with the explosion of content. So much fun! First I helped with naming the project, then created an animated logo for use on the site and on social media. Because this website is like a big magazine created from the film, I created a modular design to give an overview into many topics at a glance, and developed a color palette to be lively and fresh, yet with ASD considerations in mind. In addition, I supplied titles and interstitials for the video clips.

A fun note: when we start the work on the Beta 2, the “autistic-like” Graham will be deep into his first semester at college!