Contact: Paige Watson

STARKVILLE, Miss.--The Starkville Civitan Club is donating $1,500 to the Autism and Developmental Disabilities Clinic at Mississippi State.

The recent gift to the university partially supports a graduate assistant position in the College of Education unit and the counseling and educational psychology department.

Located in the Barry Box Building on Morrill Road, the public clinic serves clients with autism spectrum disorders, ages birth to college. Services also are available for clients with intellectual or developmental disabilities, various genetic and chromosomal disorders, including Down syndrome, as well as speech and language delays and disruptive behavior disorder.

The Starkville Civitan Club is a part of an international volunteer service organization dedicated to helping people in the local community, and the donation will help Starkville-area children with developmental disabilities.

In expressing appreciation to the club, clinic director Dan Gadke said, "This will go a long way with helping out."

Club president William Oakley said the service organization's decision to make the donation followed a presentation by Gadke on the clinic's mission. "At our next meeting, we decided we wanted to help the cause," he said.

The gift follows another recent financial boost from the Starkville Convention and Visitors Bureau's 2015 Starkville Restaurant Week fund-raiser that provided $5,000.

For details about the clinic's mission, visit www.schoolpsych.msstate.edu/schoolpsych/clinics.html.

Information about Civitan International is found at www.civitan.org; regarding work of the Starkville club, from Oakley at telephone 662-617-2317.

MSU, Mississippi's flagship research university, is online at www.msstate.edu, facebook.com/msstate, instagram.com/msstate and twitter.com/msstate.