Authors:

Kiersten L. Ratcliff

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Alabama has been severely impacted by the opioid crisis in the last decade as evidenced by high prescribing rates, rampant opioid-involved overdoses, and increasing treatment admissions. Within this study, a calibration of a time-dependent set of ordinary differential equations is presented and applied to model Alabama opioid data from 2015 through 2023 to investigate the dynamics of opioid use pre- and post- COVID-19. After simulating the crisis for those years, we predict the trajectory of the crisis from the beginning of 2024 to the beginning of 2028. We find that opioid use disorder and opioid-related deaths are expected to increase, with heroin and fentanyl use disorder ramping up while prescription opioid use disorder slows down. We briefly investigate the efficiency of different policy approaches, finding prescription-related policy to be highly impactful within our model. We then examine the impact of policy related to long-term recovery, relapse prevention, and overdose-reversal separately and together, finding key dynamics related to the heroin and fentanyl use disorder class indicating for it to be vital that these reactionary policy measures be implemented in tandem, with unintended consequences resulting otherwise. In the case implementing the policies simultaneously, we estimate threshold values key to epidemic outcomes in Alabama to inform policymakers on tangible goals to combat the crisis. 4, Between Belongingness and Unbelongingness: The Experiences of Autistic-Identifying Young Adults at Elite Higher Education Institutions TianTian Xu,° and *Michele Friedner* * Comparative Human Development, The University of Chicago, Chicago, IL 60636 USA email: tiantianxu@uchicago.edu *PI: michelefriedner@uchicago.edu As the social, psychiatric, and personal boundaries defining autism shift in our current socio-political climate, so, too, do the experiences of autistic young adults. This research considers how autistic-identifying college students actively navigate their own belongingness within the unique social context and mythos of the elite higher-education institution. I draw upon 11 semi-structured qualitative interviews with autistic-identifying college students/recent graduates to address (a) how belongingness is construed, understood, and experienced by autistic college students and (b) how prior experiences with (un)belongingness impact the ways autistic young adults perceive themselves, autism, and their past/present experiences. By focusing on "autistic-identifying" students, this research aims to contribute to the anthropological and disability justice-centered move to look beyond purely medicalized and institutionally-determined categories of diagnosis and identity validation. Instead, I focus on lived experience, belongingness, and identity formation within the particular social milieu of the elite Midwestern higher education institution. Examining "belonging" as a dynamic concept and my primary thematic lens, I explicitly locate my research questions within the current socio-political context of today whilst also addressing how intersectional experiences (with gender, class, race, etc.) inform meaning making and the negotiations of both identity and community. Three main themes emerge from my interviews as variables influencing the degree of belongingness experienced: 1) the acceptance and identification with autism as a label, 2) the university as a space of potential transformation, and 3) the interpersonal and personalized element of belonging as a social activity. While none of these factors on their own are enough to determine belongingness, it is the interaction between these variables and each person's deeply individualized experiences that create spaces where belonging can be felt and enacted. ORAL PRESENTATIONS Panel I. From Facebook to Fentanyl: Exploring Identity, Policy, and Social Change

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Chicago Area Undergraduate Research Symposium

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Co-authors:

Kiersten L. Ratcliff