Rochester's Social Philanthropists Foundation Helps Buy iPads for Autism Center

Local children with autism will have more tools at their disposal, thanks to two new Apple iPads donated to the Center for Autism Spectrum Disorders by Rochester’s Social Philanthropists Foundation.

The center's speech-language pathologist Leigh Foster said the iPads will help the center's autistic patients improve their verbal and motor skills by using the program Proloquo2go, a speech-generating device that helps children have basic conversations.

“The really cool thing that we’re going to do is we’re going to let families borrow the iPads so they can have a trial period with it and really see if it will help their child before they make the purchase,” Foster said.

The center, based in Birmingham, has been helping children for years. It provides consultation services, training and support for children with autism spectrum disorders, more commonly known as autism.

Foster has known Doug Van Slembrouck, vice president of SPF, since high school. When she noticed on Facebook that he had put $1 toward a RoboCop statue for Detroit, she jokingly suggested he put his money toward buying iPads for children.

What began as a joke soon turned into a reality as Van Slembrouck and SPF, which promotes and raises funds for area nonprofit organizations through social media, pooled resources and began collecting donations for iPads via Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn.

“The SPF was founded on the principle that by connecting with our existing networks of people and friends, we can do good,” Van Slembrouck said. “It’s about asking how can we motivate those people to actually do something.”

Within 24 hours of first putting the request online, the SPF had raised $750. By the next day, it had collected $1,100 — enough money to purchase two iPads.

 “(This is) really why the network works so well," Van Slembrouck said. "I thought this would be a perfect example of leveraging the one-click economy and behavior.”

According to Foster, the plan is to keep one iPad on site and let parents borrow the other to use with their children. She said the iPads are just large enough to keep the child’s attention, even in a crowded classroom, yet are much lighter than many other tools used for autism students.

Foster said parents are so excited about the iPads that there’s already a waiting list to take the device home.

April is Autism Awareness Month.