TECH KIDS UNLIMITED
Teaching Technology to Students who Learn Differently
Programs and results
What we aim to solve
About half (53.4%) of young adults with an ASD had ever worked for pay outside the home since leaving high school, the lowest rate among disability groups. Young adults with an ASD earned an average of $8.10 per hour, significantly lower than average wages for young adults in the comparison groups, and held jobs that clustered within fewer occupational types. Technology evens out the playing field for these young adults whose interests and strengths lend themselves well to technology jobs.
Our programs
What are the organization's current programs, how do they measure success, and who do the programs serve?
Tech Kids Unlimited Sunday Program
Tech Kids Unlimited's Sunday programs meet on select Sundays to learn a variety of different tech skills such as game design, coding, video editing, and more. The students are neurodiverse students ages 7-21.
Creative Tech Internship
The TKU Creative Tech Internship (CTI) is an internship for teens/young adults aged 17-21 interested in work or study in creative tech-based fields, and acts as a bridge between school experiences and workplace environments. CTI interns meet weekly September to June to work together on various deliverables for TKU’s client-based projects. Interns learn soft skills while working in an office environment and work on their social-emotional-learning and transition skills.
Career Readiness Internship Program
CRISP is an invite-only internship 5-week summer program for TKU’s advanced students who are either in college or are college-bound. New interns work 2 days a week while returning interns work 3 days a week at external internships. The other days are spent with TKU staff learning career readiness skills, listening to guest lecturers, and building portfolios. Students are paid a stipend for participation.
TKU Digital Agency
The TKU Digital Agency is an advanced program for teens ages 14-21 who learn differently that mimics a real workplace. Participants complete projects for real clients and are paid a stipend for their contributions. This multi-week program meets 3 times a year in fall, spring, and summer.
College Access Program
The TKU College Access Program provides a supportive environment for students who learn differently to explore college options and build college readiness skills. This program is designed for students aged 14-21 who are not currently applying to or enrolled in college. Topics to be discussed include: college experience expectations, identity development, social skills, and self-advocacy. Program content will be influenced by needs, interests, and concerns expressed by students.
Parent Talks
Throughout the year, TKU offers free parent talks on various topics related to resources and services for special needs families.
Tech Kids Unlimited Summer Program
During the summer for 8 weeks, students ages 7-21 learn a variety of different topics. During these weeklong workshops, students learn tech skills such as coding, game design, animation, and more.
Where we work
External reviews
Our results
How does this organization measure their results? It's a hard question but an important one.
Number of participants attending course/session/workshop
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Children and youth, Young adults, People with learning disabilities
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Number of students per classroom during the reporting period
This metric is no longer tracked.Totals By Year
Population(s) Served
Children and youth, Young adults, People with learning disabilities
Type of Metric
Output - describing our activities and reach
Direction of Success
Increasing
Goals & Strategy
Learn about the organization's key goals, strategies, capabilities, and progress.
Charting impact
Four powerful questions that require reflection about what really matters - results.
What is the organization aiming to accomplish?
TKU’s mission is to open up the field of digital technology and computer science
to students with disabilities, especially those with ASD, and to help them become the
techies of tomorrow. TKU is helping to change the paradigm for education and
employment for young people with disabilities. With dismal employment options for
individuals with ASD, TKU is working to open the doors to the field of technology so
students can be independent and learn the essential tech and computer science skills
needed to prepare for internships, post-secondary education and ultimately jobs.
What are the organization's key strategies for making this happen?
By focusing on a strength-based and project-based approach we are able to engage our students in a way they might not have been able to be engaged prior to our program. We have different pipelines for students based on age and level of interest and experience. Our youth program is for kids ages 7-13 where students learn technology foundational skills and geek out. They are able to work on their social/emotional, and learning skills in a safe and nurturing environment. Our teen/young adult program for ages 14-21 is for students who are work on real client work. This allows them to work on job readiness and transition skills. We also have an internship program for students who have taken multiple classes of ours. This allows them to prepare for a real internship or job.
What are the organization's capabilities for doing this?
We have a very supportive and nurturing environment with trained social workers, occupational therapist, tech teaching artists, and tech counselors. We try to maintain a 3:1 student to teacher ratio which allows for students to get the support that they need. We also have dedicated administrative staff who work on curriculum to ensure that we maintain an adaptive classroom. Our curriculum utilizes Universal Design for Learning which allows for different kinds of learners to be engaged in class. We therefore can take all levels of experience and work with them to ensure they are working towards a goal.
What have they accomplished so far and what's next?
We have expanded our program into different branches, creating our internship program and young adult/teen program. We have been featured in news outlets for our work and won awards for the projects our students have worked on such as Emoticon and the Spark Contest. We have also released an app, LOLA to help students with their social and emotional learning outside of the classroom. We are working towards making our program even more robust and creating even more branches of our program to reach more students with multiple goals.
Financials
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Operations
The people, governance practices, and partners that make the organization tick.
Connect with nonprofit leaders
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- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
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Connect with nonprofit leaders
SubscribeBuild relationships with key people who manage and lead nonprofit organizations with GuideStar Pro. Try a low commitment monthly plan today.
- Analyze a variety of pre-calculated financial metrics
- Access beautifully interactive analysis and comparison tools
- Compare nonprofit financials to similar organizations
Want to see how you can enhance your nonprofit research and unlock more insights? Learn More about GuideStar Pro.
TECH KIDS UNLIMITED
Board of directorsas of 02/28/2024
Alex McKay
BlackRock
Ryan Linden
MURAL
Joel Bencosme
PWC
Jonathan Hill
Pace University
Luke DuBois
NYU Tandon School of Engineering
Roseanne Legrand
Board leadership practices
GuideStar worked with BoardSource, the national leader in nonprofit board leadership and governance, to create this section.
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Board orientation and education
Does the board conduct a formal orientation for new board members and require all board members to sign a written agreement regarding their roles, responsibilities, and expectations? Yes
Organizational demographics
Who works and leads organizations that serve our diverse communities? Candid partnered with CHANGE Philanthropy on this demographic section.
Leadership
The organization's leader identifies as:
Race & ethnicity
No data
Gender identity
No data
Transgender Identity
No data
Sexual orientation
No data
Disability
No data