Brandan Guzman rolls across the lawn in a plastic barrel, glides along the playground on a scooter board and swats balls with a giant tennis racket.
Several girls help the second-grader around the playground, offering encouragement: "Good job, Brandan," "Awesome job."
Brandan has been diagnosed with autism – a developmental disability that affects a person's ability to communicate and interact with others.
But during recess at Gold Ridge Elementary School in Folsom, barriers between special education students and those in the general student population are broken down. Much of the credit goes to the school's autism social facilitation club.
Students in the club sign a lifetime pledge, that reads in part, "I promise to care about you, keep you from harm and help you with your troubles."
Special ed teacher Elizabeth Shepherd formed the club last fall with the enthusiastic support of Principal Patricia Carbone.
The club started with 13 members, but now more than 300 students are trained volunteers. Shepherd believes it's the only program like it in the region.
That's a lot of helpers – and potential friends – for the school's 20 children who have been diagnosed with autism.
Shepherd said the children come from throughout the Folsom Cordova Unified School District. Classes for autistic students also are available this year at several other schools in Rancho Cordova and Folsom.
A teacher for nearly 20 years, Shepherd said she came up with the idea for a social facilitation club after completing a UC Davis Extension autism certificate program last summer.
Maureen Burness, Folsom Cordova's assistant superintendent of student support services, said 18 teachers and other classroom staff members completed the certificate program in response to the increasing number of autistic children in the district.
That increase isn't just local. Over the past two decades, the prevalence of autism in California children has risen for still-unexplained reasons.
Students in Shepherd's club have learned to use techniques to help autistic children meet their individual education plans. They spend several of their recesses each week volunteering with their autistic peers.
"I like helping out with these kids because they learn to interact with other kids," said fifth-grader Nikki Budd.
She regularly helps children navigate an agility course to improve their balance, another issue faced by many with autism.
"You have to encourage them so they won't quit," she said.
Cassie Slaughter, a facilitation club officer, thinks the club has been a boon to all students at the school.
Autistic children, the fifth-grader said, are more comfortable around the students who are learning to understand autism.
"They are so sweet," Cassie said of the children she works with.
Although less than a year old, the club has impressed parents.
Like many parents of autistic children, Deborah Goldsmith and her husband agonized over placing their 10-year-old son Jack in special education.
"But by the second grade, we realized he needed more care," she said.
Goldsmith has noticed at least one significant change in her son this year.
"He's happy to come to school," she said.
Through the social facilitation club, Goldsmith said, students who didn't understand autism are getting to know her son.
"Children now say, 'Hi, Jack,' " she said.
For autistic children, making friends is especially difficult, Shepherd said. People with autism have trouble connecting with others in a wide range of ways, such as failing to make eye contact or understanding facial expressions or gestures.
But the student interaction at Gold Ridge Elementary is creating friendships that may otherwise have never occurred.
Amy Palumbo said her 8-year-old daughter Angela, a club volunteer, "mostly talks about Jack" when she comes home from school.
The club has even provided her daughter with a career goal.
"When I grow up, I want to be a special ed teacher," Angela said.
The connection between students also is noticeable in talking with children in Shepherd's special education class.
Asked what he likes most about school, 8-year-old Brendan Evans pointed to a corner of his classroom where club officers were sitting.
"The social facilitators," he said.
Call the Bee's Walter Yost, (916) 608-7449.
