ASU classes and clubs were among about 12,000 people who participating in the annual Walk Now For Autism at Tempe Beach Park on Sunday morning.
Southwest Autism Research and Resource Center, a nonprofit organization that works to inform people about autism and help those impacted by it, hosted the Tempe walk.
Marketing and management junior Max Dembow and marketing senior Jeffrey Franks talked to professors and ASU students to help raise awareness about autism in the community.
The pair organized a group from the W. P. Carey School of Business to walk in the event.
About 3,000 students from ASU participated in the walk, Denbow said, something he called a big accomplishment.
“The whole campus has really gotten involved,” he said.
Dembow has been involved with raising awareness about autism since he was in high school. When he came to ASU and had to work with a nonprofit organization for a business class, he chose to work with the Southwest Autism Research Resource Center, he said.
“The main reason we’re all so into it is because [autism] is such a big problem in society,” Dembow said.
It is really important that people help raise money so more research can be done about autism, he said, because there are many who don’t realize how many people are affected by the disorder.
Franks said 1 in 93 people are diagnosed with autism, and research is helping those people learn how to manage it.
“We’re able to help get awareness outside the typical demographic,” he said.
Franks and Dembow talked to professors, students, sororities and other groups on campus to help raise money and awareness for the event, Franks said.
Bryanell Rop, a computer information systems sophomore, said she has an autistic friend so the event is very personal to her.
“I feel like it’s beneficial for the community to know about autism,” she said.
Rop recently moved to Arizona from Florida where she participated in similar events like Race for the Cure.
In Florida there weren’t autism events, so Rop said she was glad to see a community effort to raise awareness in Arizona.
Evan Danzinger, volunteer chairman for the walk for the second year, has a 5-year-old autistic son named Eric.
This year, he said the community raised about $345,000 for autism research.
Danzinger and his wife became involved with Southwest Autism Research and Resource Center when they began to attend informational workshops about autism because of their son, he said.
“People affected can use all the information and help they can get,” Danzinger said.
Sunday’s walk included the largest autism resource fair in the nation, he said.
People who are impacted by autism or know someone with autism have to learn many things they never would have expected, Danzinger said.
People learn to deal and cope with autism daily, he said, and you still love that person just as much.
