Sarah R Ruf's blog

by Justin Caligari, guest contributor from Mesa, AZ

My name is Justin and I was diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder when I was 35 years old.

Welcome to March - we hope everyone had a great St. Patrick’s Day. St. Patrick’s Day is celebrated annually on March 17, the anniversary of the “Apostle of Ireland’s” death in the fifth century. In the United States, the holiday is typically used to celebrate an individual’s Irish heritage and eat Irish bacon (commonly known as corned beef) and cabbage. March also means that March Madness is upon us! Congratulations to the University of Arizona Wildcats and the Grand Canyon University Antelopes, both of whom made the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament.

A slow start

by Jason Snead, Research and Communication Specialist

When the Arizona Division of Developmental Disabilities (DDD) asked Arizonans for ideas on how to use American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds, two mothers of children with disabilities, Brandi Coon and Lauryn Van Rooy, had a perfect idea: allow parents to continue being paid caregivers of their minor age children, as they had been since the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic.