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Jan Hanson is an EdD candidate at York St John University, researching the transitions of neurodivergent students from higher education to employment. Through her professional practice supporting students via Disabled Students’ Allowances and her work with the National Autistic Society, she repeatedly observed a ‘transition cliff’ where all support abruptly ceases at graduation. Jan’s doctoral research shows that 0 per cent of participants received transition support and 99 per cent were unaware of Access to Work funding, indicating systemic institutional failures rather than individual shortcomings.
Receiving her own autism and ADHD diagnoses during the research journey transformed Jan from an outsider researcher to an insider researcher, providing a crucial lived experience perspective. She developed the Multi-Directional Ecological Framework to capture how neurodivergent students navigate simultaneous pressures across multiple support systems during workplace transitions. Her work centres the disability rights principle ‘nothing about us without us’, positioning neurodivergent students as experts in their own experiences.