Startups

It’s more than a rebrand: why Autism Expressed is now called Digitability

Michele McKeone, a former special education teacher, built a digital skills platform for students with autism in 2011. The rebrand points to a broader scope.

Michele McKeone, founder and CEO of Digitability. (Courtesy photo)

Autism Expressed, the digital education platform Michele McKeone built to help students with autism develop digital skills, quietly rebranded as Digitability over the spring.
The company was founded in 2011 by McKeone as a result of her experience in special education while working for the School District of Philadelphia. But now, the company wants to help students with all kinds of cognitive disabilities develop their digital literacy, and it kicked things off with a nifty shoutout in this CNET piece.
“McKeone saw an opportunity to use technology and project-based learning as a way to teach important technical skills, as well as foster the ability to think critically, solve problems and live independently,” wrote CNET’s Marguerite Reardon.
Read the full story
McKeone told us over email that Digitability is currently working with the School District’s Office of Specialized Services to expand the company’s digital literacy program across the 8,000 special needs students in Philly high schools.
But this looks like more than your garden-variety rebranding. While Autism Expressed was focused around curriculum and learning, Digitability taps a bit more into the waters of workplace training, with programs geared at helping teachers turn their classrooms into professional environments, thus helping students with cognitive disabilities get a sense of what the professional world actually looks like.
The company currently has a full staff of four (and is looking to hire two more soon) and is HQ’d at WeWork NoLibs.

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