Each year the senior social work majors are required to complete a senior project. This year the nine seniors are focusing on the Autism Initiative at Mercyhurst (AIM) program. The goal is to get the Mercyhurst community’s thoughts, opinions and feelings on the program. There is a Google survey that Mercyhurst students and faculty can take to see what they know, what they would want to know more about and their overall general attitudes toward the AIM program.

With such a small group of nine seniors, each of them will be able to get more involved in their senior project. There is also an Applied Sociology and Social Work club at Mercyhurst, which is very involved in planning advocacy events on campus.

The club includes everyone in both social work and sociology majors and is great to be a part of for students who want to make a difference and help other people. “We are still in the works of partnering with a Mercyhurst sports team to plan an AIM advocacy and inclusion game,” said Mary Bauer, senior Social Work major and President of the Applied Sociology and Social Work club. “Our goal is to have this game by the end of the semester,” said Bauer.

The details of this are still being worked out, but the Mercyhurst Community will definitely be hearing more about this event once everything is finalized. The game will be an exciting and fun way to help advocate for inclusion as well as diversity in the Mercyhurst community.

The nine social work seniors are excited about their project and want to encourage everyone at Mercyhurst to take a few minutes to fill out their survey. The survey only takes about two minutes to complete and it is completely anonymous, so everyone is encouraged to fill it out!

The link to the survey can be found on the Mercyhurst Social Work’s Instagram (@mercyhurst_socialwork). In addition, one can scan the provided QR code to participate. It is important for a large amount of the Mercyhurst community to fill out this survey so that the seniors can understand what needs to be done to help improve the program.

With the information gathered from the survey, the seniors will be able to advocate better for both the program and the students who are a part of it.