Posted By Diane


June 16, 2014

Pictured are: Jacquie Morse and Lori Weston June 16, 2014
Jacquie spoke us today about a rapidly growing concern. Most of you know that autism is rapidly on the rise. Almost everyone knows someone who has an autistic child or an adult. Just 5 years ago the statistic was 1 in 110 children were on the Autism Spectrum Disorder. But today that number has jumped to 1 in 68 children. Of those students with ASD only 56% will graduate from high school. Currently we have 1 to 1.5 million Americans living with Autism Spectrum Disorder. The cost of autism over the lifespan is 3.2 million dollars per person with 60% of the cost in adult care alone. In 10 years time it is projected that autism will cost our nation $200 – $300 BILLION a year. According to a current Population Survey from December 2010 by the Bureau of Labor Statistics states that the unemployment rate for people with disabilities was at 14%, compared with 9% for people without a disability. Additionally, during the same period, only 21% of all adults with disabilities participated in the labor force as compared with 69% of the non-disabled population That is where we hope to change lives. Starting May 31st of 2014 Autism Love and Bee Morse Farm presents Farming 2 Shine, an up and coming farm where handicap individuals come to learn how to farm. Our goals are to provide an education into a industry that the world relies on and to teach them a vocation that they can depend on for a livelihood. We want to teach each of our Handi-Farmers that they can depend on themselves and give them the confidence, knowledge and a sense of contributing to their communities. While we have a structured curriculum planned out, everything is taught in a fun, hands on way. Each day we meet, brings a new lesson and activity like: *Learning about our tools and how to use them safely *Learning how worms help our garden by releasing worms into the garden and studying the benefits they provide. *Learning to eat from our garden and fun, healthy recipes *How do bees help our garden and across pollination

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