AuKids assembled an outstanding panel of experts to ensure the content we provided reflected the views and opinions of people who live and breathe autism

Chris Barson

Is the Founder of Positive About Autism training company. Awesome because he has a really engaging way of writing and says 'folks' a lot.

DR LUKE BEARDON

Popular speaker and senior lecturer in autism. Awesome because despite being an award-winning autism professional, he wears jeans for conferences, swears during his lectures and isn't afraid to speak his mind when it comes to myth busting and autism.

Breanne BLACK (NOW KIRKHAM)

Specialist paediatric occupational therapist at Cool for Kids Occupational Therapy. Awesome because she can take a REALLY difficult subject such as tactile sensitivity, and use every day language to make it simple to understand.

Olga Bogdashina

Researcher and author. Awesome because noone tells it like Olga does! She has a brilliant mind, combined with wit and warmth and the perspective of an autism mum, she unpicks the most difficult part of autism; understanding how the autistic mind collects, sifts and categorises information.

Phoebe Caldwell

Expert practitioner in Intensive Interaction and trains professionals, therapists, managers and carers in the approach. Awesome because despite being in her Eighties, she has never lost her passion for helping others decipher the body language of hard to reach youngsters with autism. 

Jennifer Cook O'Toole

Author.  Awesome because she uses her personal perspective of Asperger's to help her Aspie kids grow up sorted and confident, and now her humorous books, website and vlog help you to do the same.

GINA DAVIES

Founder of the Gina Davies Autism Centre, Gina is a genius at using creative ways of helping autistic kids to communicate and engage.  Awesome because we once saw her silence an entire conference hall by starting her talk with a puppet. She was proving a point - that we have to make ourselves irresistible!

Adele Devine

SEN teacher and founder of I.T. games company SEN Assist, which produces award winning CD-Rom games for special needs children, author of Colour Coding for Learners with Autism.  Awesome because it wasn't enough for her to be a cracking teacher of autistic students.  She just had to share with the world how she did it - and give them the tools to make education easier.

Dr Paul Holland

Chartered psychologist. Awesome because when it comes to understanding behaviour, he does so sensitively and positively.

Chris Hoyle

Specialist sleep counsellor for the Together Trust charity. Awesome because she has given parents back their evenings. 

Greg Loynes

Admissions, Transitions and Outreach Manager at Together Trust’s Inscape House School. Awesome because his enthusiasm and imagination gets everyone buzzing…he truly understands what mainstream schools need to do to be totally inclusive and school by school, he makes it happen.

Dr Heather MacKenzie

Canadian speech and language pathologist, author and creator of the SPARK programme. Awesome because noone but NOONE has given the time and energy to problems in self-regulation and executive functioning that she has done, creating practical solutions to difficulties that aren't given enough air time.

GARETH MOREWOOD

Director of Curriculum Support at Priestnall School in Stockport and author of the Optimus Education blog SENCOLOGY, Gareth is an expert in mainstream inclusion, writing several papers with ]Manchester University on the subject. He’s currently on secondment as education advisor to training and psychology services organisation Studio 3. Awesome because if the world listened to Gareth, more autistic pupils would be happy at school. Thankfully he trains schools both nationally and internationally.

CHRISTINE THORNLEY

Christine is a Partner specialising in providing Will, Trust and Inheritance Tax advice to families with SEN children at Irwin Mitchell solicitors in Manchester. Christine has always offered our parents straightforward and easy to understand advice on setting up wills (see Issue 19 ‘Where There’s a Will There’s A Way). She’s also contributed to advice in Autism Answers.

Alis Rowe

Creator The Curly Hair Project. Awesome because she uses sweet cartoons to help women and girls with Asperger Syndrome and their non-autistic loved ones understand each other.

ABOUT OUR EXPERTS

How do we choose our autism experts? Well, it helps if you understand how we work. Think of AuKids as a friend who just happens to read a lot of books and attend a lot of events on autism. So, if we've seen someone speak and we think what they have to say is brilliant, then we can't wait to tell you about them!

If we read a book and we think it's very exciting - too good to miss - we'll ask the author to contribute to AuKids. We know that you don't have all the time in the world to attend autism conferences.  You don't have to. If someone is great, we'll make sure they share their knowledge. It really gets our team buzzing to come across someone new with great ideas. We cannot wait to approach them to ask if they'll contribute.

None of our experts are paid. They like what AuKids is doing and contribute voluntarily. The advice they give is impartial, just like our own.  What they also have in common is the ability to explain their ideas about autism exceptionally clearly and without being patronising.

We seek autism expertise in every area. So we have experts who have autism themselves, and have the ability to share their personal experiences of autism in unique ways. Of course, our readers are also experts and we seek advice and information from other families, who pool their knowledge. We have researchers who have broken new ground in their area of specialism. We have professionals in education who have first hand experience of helping autistic children to get the best out of school. We also have contributors who specialise in autism and are clinicians in the fields of speech and language therapy and occupational therapy. Clinical psychologists and psychiatrists are called upon for specific features. 

One of the great things about writing a magazine like AuKids, is that as its reputation continues to grow among autism cricles, we've been able to attract the very best names in autism from the UK and abroad.

We're so proud they support us and that you are able to benefit from their extensive autism knowledge as a result.

We'd like to thank them all for making AuKids so special and for helping all our children towards better, brighter futures.