Non-speakers

Background

This year, via our collaboration with The Telepathy Tapes, our talented science team brought our unconditional love and rigorous scientific ethos to help better understand the gifted minds of nonspeaking individuals with autism. 

The image is from a figure in our first article about Mind Discovery in nonspeaking autistic individuals. 

The Bridge Curriculum

The Bridge is a compassion-based curriculum designed to help nonspeaking neurodivergent individuals thrive by training communication and regulation partners (CRPs) and their families. Completed by April 2026, it will offer a comprehensive 8-module pre-certification training program with expert Q&A, community access. The Bridge will include modules covering apraxia, oculomotor difficulties, the importance of love, left/right brain development, nonlocal communication, and giftedness among other topics. Individuals with interest in continuing the program can enroll in a follow-up program that confers certification after completing in-person practice with the course leaders. Within its first year, the program aims to reach 2,000 students, support 300 new CRPs, and improve the lives of 4,000 nonspeakers and their families. 

Our team recorded a casual Zoom conversation (complete with moustache/beard filters) about the difficulty and importance inherent in helping nonspeakers communicate; watch a 5-min excerpt: https://tinyurl.com/TheBridgeSpelling

Thanks to generous gifts from an anonymous donor, an anonymous foundation, and TILT supporter Geoffrey Oelsner, this entire project has been funded. Please consider supporting our other projects, below!

Neurostimulation to Support Body-Brain Wisdom

This proposal outlines a 12-month scientific study to evaluate whether transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), a non-invasive and low-risk neuromodulation technique, can improve communication, wellbeing, and self-regulation in non-speaking autistic individuals. Twenty participants will undergo a 10-week baseline period (no neurostimulation), followed by a 10-week intervention with weekly tDCS sessions tailored to their individual goals (expressive communication, compulsivity/anxiety reduction), and then a 10-week follow-up period (no neurostimulation). All neurostimulation interventions will be paired with language practice tasks. Outcomes will be measured through behavioral observations, standardized scales, self- and caregiver-reports, and blinded video reviews, with feasibility and safety closely monitored. The study aims to provide direct benefits to participants and their families, contribute to the scientific field through publications and presentations, and lay groundwork for scaling interventions that shift perceptions of ability in this population.