Human Development and Family Science PhD student receives 2026 Focus Award

Amy Janis(Photo provided)

Amy Janis, a PhD student in Purdue University’s Department of Human Development and Family Science, is a 2026 recipient of the university’s Focus Award. The award recognizes those who have made outstanding contributions to furthering Purdue’s commitment to disability accessibility. 

Janis has made accessibility a driving force in her work across the university, touching classrooms, laboratories and physical spaces alike. According to her graduate advisor, associate professor AJ Schwichtenberg, what distinguishes Janis is not simply her commitment to accessibility but her capacity to translate it into lasting, structural change.

 Since summer 2023, Janis has co-led biannual workshops on neurodiversity-informed teaching through Purdue’s Disability Resource Center, reaching more than 150 faculty and staff. These workshops emphasize practical strategies, including multiple instructional modalities, closed captioning and streamlined one-page syllabi. Building on this work, she is co-leading the development of a neuro-inclusive teaching packet for distribution across 100 Purdue classrooms that will embed these strategies into the everyday fabric of instruction far beyond her home department.

Janis applies these same inclusive principles in her own teaching and mentorship. As a teaching assistant (TA), she has served more than 250 undergraduate students and has been a guest lecturer for courses focused on neurodiversity and disability. Through the support she provides as a TA, she consistently challenges students to examine how classroom norms and instructional practices shape participation for individuals with disabilities, encouraging not just awareness but a culture of advocacy.

Within Schwichtenberg’s Sleep and Developmental Studies Laboratory, Janis has been instrumental in building and sustaining an accessible environment for a rotating cohort of eight to 16 undergraduate researchers each semester, with neurodivergent students consistently representing a significant share.

During weekly lab meetings, Janis is known to be a reliable, proactive voice for the needs of neurodiverse members, listening when they have concerns, acting when they need support and advocating for change. Her mentorship centers on self-advocacy, helping students identify barriers, articulate their needs and navigate academic environments with confidence. The goal she holds for every student is that they leave with a clearly identified strength they can carry into their next giant leap.

Janis’ commitment to removing barriers extends to the physical environment. When student feedback revealed the lab’s physical workspace presented challenges for daily work, she helped to find a solution. Co-leading the Inclusive Space Project, she secured grant funding to redesign four undergraduate research laboratories across Purdue, benefiting 35 students in a single semester. The project applied evidence-based design principles to create flexible, sensory-considerate workspaces that better support physical accessibility and neurodivergent needs. Crucially, students were not passive beneficiaries of the project; they were active leaders and participants throughout the process of shaping their own research environments.

Amy embodies the spirit of the Focus Award in the fullest sense. As a busy doctoral student, she has chosen to look outward by finding ways to make Purdue more accessible. Her impact is already measurable in the classrooms she has transformed, the students she has empowered and the spaces she has redesigned.

Jacob Amberger, AJ Schwichtenberg and Denise Buhrmester contributed to this story.