Aashna Parsa at the International Youth Conference 13 advocating for strengths-based neurodiversity and disability inclusion in the United Nations' Youth, Peace and Security agenda & Global Youth Goals Framework. Watch 14 YO Aashna Parsa, Founder and President of Youth for Neurodiversity Inc., give policy testimony on May 22, 2026 at the 13th International Youth Conference (IYC13) toward the LA Pathway to Peace declaration to be presented by IYC to the United Nations. With o

The 2026 NeuroTech Frontiers Summit was a special full-circle moment for Aashna Parsa, founder of Youth for Neurodiversity Inc. (YND). From a 13 year-old attendee of the inaugural 2025 summit at the Frist Center of Autism and Innovation in Tennessee, to seven months later at the 2026 summit with a neurodiversity allyship exhibit and live demos of Aashna's app, Ally in Training™. YND is deeply grateful to Aras Sheikhi, CEO of Janus Innovation Hub and visionary organizer of th

The 2026 summit was a high-impact event bringing innovators, investors, academia, and advocates together on May 19, 2026, in San Diego. As we represented Youth for Neurodiversity's innovation, Ally in Training™, we met several inspiring founders and products. Check out below for Tarragon, Social Q, Stella, Drive and Thrive, IVRSTAR, DecodeMe.AI, AVRAS™ by Incuentro LLC, and Mindly. For a complete list of exhibitors, visit neurotech-frontiers.com.

A proud partner of the California School-Based Health Alliance and a community member of Governor Gavin Newsom’s Office of Community Partnerships and Strategic Communications, Youth for Neurodiversity exhibits at the statewide school health conference in Los Angeles, Universal City on April 27-28, 2026.

There was a time when I struggled to understand why the world felt so overwhelming. The lights were too bright, the noise too sharp, the conversations too fast. I saw patterns where others saw randomness, I focused where others drifted, and I felt deeply, sometimes too deeply for my own comfort. I knew I was different but didn’t always know what that difference meant. I used to think my differences were obstacles, barriers that separated me from others.

Aashna Parsa, Founder, Davidson Young Scholar Growing up, I watched my brother, endlessly curious, turn his voracious reading into a spark that lit up his future. He'd spend hours researching teen healthcare access issues, not because he had to, but because he needed to know more. My mom, his fiercest champion, fought against whispers in our community that labeled him "different." Being undiagnosed herself, she saw his strengths, his hyperfocus and brilliance, where others sa