Each year, incoming first-year students are given the opportunity to participate in AIM, an early-arrival program intended to help ease students into college-life. Students spend the week going into the city, getting acclimated with campus and participating in seminars designed to give extra insight into the college transition.
This year, AIM teamed up with the ASPIRE program, a support service for students on the autism spectrum.
“We know our students have a challenging time with social connections, especially moving into a residence hall where there are lots of people and lots of things happening those first couple of days,” said Alli Gatta, M.S., LPC, NCC, the assistant director of the ASPIRE program. “We were able to give students a chance to interact and work in a smaller group and with other students in ASPIRE and also outside of it.”
Xander Viele ’25 participated in both programs. Not knowing much about the AIM program, Viele nevertheless decided to sign up and said he was “blown away” once it started.
“It’s the perfect way to get into the college experience before classes start, and also to really get settled in,” Viele said. “I mean not just into your dorm, but to meet some new and interesting people.”
While ASPIRE students have participated in AIM in the past, this is the first year the program formally collaborated with AIM.
“Our students have done AIM before, but just signed up on their own,” Gatta said. “We didn’t really have much of a role in it other than working really closely with Dr. McDevitt and all of them in [the Office of] Student Success. This was the first year we really helped in the forming stages.”
To ease ASPIRE students into the program, additional events were planned.
“We did a couple activities with them before the AIM stuff started,” Gatta said. “We did a lunch with them and their families, we did some kind of prep work, just getting them to know each other, and then they started all of the AIM activities.”
Tate Fryczynski ’22, an AIM mentor and ASPIRE peer mentor, also worked for the program. He was able to help other mentors with their questions and was also someone the ASPIRE students could connect with.
“I was someone who could relate to the ASPIRE students, because I myself am on the autism spectrum,” Fryczynski said. “[I was] someone who would have a special insight into what the ASPIRE students need.”
Fryczynski is now a friendly face on campus for ASPIRE students and provides additional support as they transition to campus-life.
Not only was this new partnership beneficial for the students in the ASPIRE program, but this collaboration was an opportunity to create a more inclusive environment on campus, according to Gatta.
“We’re always working, not only to provide support to our students, but to change the culture a little bit,” Gatta said. “People see Kinney as this little thing off to the side on an island and we’re constantly trying to make bridges off of that island. We want our students to be in every single aspect of campus.”
The collaboration between AIM and ASPIRE allowed for a layer of support that shows the character of St. Joe’s and its commitment to the campus community.
“I thought I would go to a school where I felt good about who I was and that’s how I got into the ASPIRE program,” Viele said. “The AIM program’s really added that support for me.”
