Week 1

Hello. My name is Sara and I am a Senior at Brandman University. I am majoring in Applied Studies. This major worked best for me as I have an eclectic variety of courses at Brandman and at the junior college I attend(ed).  I have attended Brandman University on and off for 8 years. Due to personal and family circumstances my educational journey has taken quiet the scenic route, with stops at parenthood, many different moves, new jobs, and just at the many points of my wonderful life. Although I wish I could have finished sooner I am happy to now be at the end of this certain path with my Bachelor Degree set to be completed in December. I currently, and for 4 years, have worked as an instructional aide, the last two years being in a preschool autism classroom. It is here that I have found my passion in which I want to pursue for a career, a Special Education Teacher. After I complete my degree in December I plan to enroll in the intern program in my area and begin my teaching internship. This is such a long awaited goal and I am so excited for this next piece of my journey.

As I begin to think about my research topic I initially just think- Autism! I know this is a broad subject with so many potential routes but I know that is where I want to start. Being in the field I am any knowledge pertaining to Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) will be beneficial and interesting to me. I am looking forward to narrowing down this topic. Areas of information literacy that I hope to improve on are the ability to evaluate information critically and to incorporate selected information into my knowledge base and value system, as discussed in ACRL Information Literacy Competency Standards.