Passport: The Degree Program for Unique Learners
Passport™ is a comprehensive model program designed to help prepare highly motivated young adults challenged with intellectual and learning disabilities for careers and independence. Passport's strategy for success begins with a focus on the whole person in three critical domains: academics, social and life skills, and workplace development. It uses a curriculum with 52 sequenced courses, an alternative assessment system, and culminates in an Associate in Essential Studies degree.
Passport classes are small, challenging, and experiential in nature, with an emphasis on problem solving, cognitive processing, teamwork, and the skills necessary to transition to work and the community. We believe that students can learn at different rates and still reach their full potential, together, when given the opportunity. Students are given individual attention and typically will finish requirements for the degree in three to four years.
Passport was created for individuals who have received extensive special education services in K-12, and are considered higher functioning special education students with diagnoses involving intellectual and learning challenges. The program focuses on students who would have difficulty navigating in a traditional college classroom because most participants in this selective program generally attain scores below the typical range on specific standardized tests of intellectual ability and academic performance.
Functionally, the ideal candidate for the Passport Program will have a an ability in the low-average to borderline range of intelligence as measured by standardized I.Q. tests (70-90), reading in the fifth to eighth grade level with math typically lower. Most students are 18-25 and have had some work experience, either volunteer or paid.
Students have a variety of diagnoses including those within the autism spectrum, high functioning multiple learning disorders involving reading, mathematics, and expressive writing, and developmental or cognitive disabilities. Passport is not a match for all students and is not appropriate for individuals diagnosed with sever mood disorders, conduct disorders, or personality disorders.
Passport Program: Sampling of Core Courses
Academics
- Essential Reading and Writing: World Literature
- Learning Strategies
- Changing Surface of the Earth
- Math Skills
- Critical Thinking through Film
- Conversations
- Brain Basics
- Nutrition and Personal Health
- Healthy Relationships
- Yoga
- Problem Solvers in the Workplace
- Self Advocacy
- Conversations in the Workplace
- Computer Applications
- Field Experiences