A local news interview with Richard Schreiber about the New York City Autism, Tech Innovation and Career Expo. Schreiber (organizer and parent) frames the expo as a neurodiversity- and employment-focused event showcasing holistic and tech-enabled, evidence-informed supports (virtual reality, mobile apps) created with input from autistic people and advocates. He also shares a personal story about his daughter Katerina, describing past treatments (Adderall, ABA) and a move toward alternative/holistic approaches (essential oils). The expo is presented as family-friendly, running 9:00–17:00 at the High School of Art and Design, 245 East 56th Street, with quiet rooms and activities for children.
Questions this video answers
The New York City Autism, Tech Innovation and Career Expo.
Richard Schreiber.
9:00 to 5:00 (9 AM to 5 PM).
High School of Art and Design, 245 East 56th Street, New York City.
Katerina.
Chapters
Highlighting an event that's working to facilitate conversations around neurodiversity, employment and how it can be improved.
That's right. The New York City Autism, Tech Innovation and Career Expo is coming up this weekend. And we're joined now by Richard Schreiber, the organizer of that event. Richard, thank you so much for joining us this morning.
Thank you for having me. It's an extraordinary opportunity to share with New Yorkers what we're about. Thank you.
Of course, it's important information. Now, this expo idea all came about with about your daughter Katerina, who has autism. Can you talk to us a little bit about how after so many years of therapy and pharmaceutical options, you pushed to a more holistic option for your family and your daughter?
Yeah, well, it really all happened. Imagine this, you go to pick up your daughter at elementary school on her last day of class and you get there and you see that she's crying and she's standing off by herself. And I go to her and I say, katerina, what's wrong? And she says, daddy, for six years nobody wanted to be my friend. And that was just. That hit me like a knife in the chest. But it was a wake up call from my wife and I because it told us what we were doing wasn't working. And at that time she was on Adderall. She was involved in what can be cookie cutter ABA or Advanced Behavioral Analysis Services. So we had to come up with a different plan and all of us parents owe that for our children on the spectrum. And we did. My wife became an expert in essential oils. We took our daughter off of Adderall. The essential oils that she has been on now for years have been transformative. You know, now she's a five foot seven, life of the party, incredibly articulate and can't shut her up sometimes. Teenager and, and it's just been an incredible journey that we've been on, but a heart wrenching one at times. So we want to share what we've been through through our expo to other parents so maybe they don't have to go through the same path and journey.
So Richard, you mentioned the essential oils there and we want to talk a little bit about what exactly parents will experience at this expo. And we know the word is innovation. So take us through some of the other measures you'll be introducing people to.
Sure. Our expo is all about, as you mentioned, alternative, yes, even holistic, but still evidence based solutions that some have a tech aspect to it. We're using attributes like virtual reality. One of our vendors there has a whole catalog of virtual reality experiences which are amazing in the E learning space today to help people with autism really navigate certain circumstances, like how to talk to a police officer, how to cross the street. And we also have mobile apps that really are designed to help teach autistic people from their perspective. And the big shift that we're really trying to promote and create a mission around is most autism services are really created and organized from the top down by people in academia and in the medical profession. And while they're well intentioned, a lot of those services are really not geared from the autistic person's point of view. And that's what we're trying to change. That's what we're trying to come up with a mission about. And that's where I think our expo is so unique because we don't have a bunch of academias and clinicians and people that are talking about autism from a more clinical perspective, which is great. And we're not focusing on cures and genetics. We're focusing on real evidence based solutions that are from the autistic person's point of view and designed from them with input from them via autism advocates and such, for sure.
And we want parents to be able to get out there tomorrow. So can you give us a quick rundown? Where is it happening? At what time tomorrow?
Sure. It'll be from 9 to 5. It's at the wonderful High School of art and Design, 245 East 56th street on the east side. Just an amazingly vibrant, progressive, inclusive, diverse and equal school run by an amazing principal. It's the ideal location. It'll be family friendly. You can bring your kids. We'll have activities where they can take care of themselves, quiet rooms in case they need a moment. We'll have food delivered around lunchtime. So it's going to be an all day event, but we encourage parents to come and try to stay as long as they can because you don't want to miss out on some of our amazing speakers and exhibitors because you're going to see things that you probably won't see it at any of your expo to date.
All right, very important information there.
Thank you so much. Richard Schreiber there joining us, introducing us to this very special Autism Expo again, as he mentioned, happening tomorrow. Richard, thank you so very much.
Thanks for joining us.
Thank you both, really appreciate it. Have a blessed day.
