Coming Up: Demise of the Dyspraxia Foundation
Last month the Dyspraxia Foundation announced its closure after thirty-five years of operation in the United Kingdom promoting and raising awareness of the developmental co-ordination learning difficulty and recognised disability. The closure of the charity has been received with a mixed reception but it leaves British dyspraxic’s without a dedicated national charity unlike other neurodivergent conditions like autism, dyslexia and ADHD. Of the condition which a tenth of the population of many are undiagnosed with the condition where awareness of the condition is less in comparison to its sister learning difficulty dyslexia. Dyslexia is commonly understood within society as a neurological difference with struggling with reading and writing where reading physical copies of a book can be difficult with concentration and comprehension with letters muddling. With writing how to form sentences and write structured paragraphs with correct spelling and grammar. Without ignoring the difficulties of dyslexia; dyspraxia can be a disabling condition impacting quality of experience of school and abilities to retain employment. I can noticeably see how I am disabled by dyspraxia as it is portrayed very visibly affecting balance and co-ordination of how it can be difficult learning and doing shoelaces, riding a bike or driving as it translates from greek as ‘bad at doing’.
I’ve never had any direct relation to the charity and have only observed its work on social media. Knowing the significance of it’s thirty-five years and the change of culture around neurodiversity over the four decades I want to honour this significant moment for the community by examining the impact and legacy of the Dyspraxia Foundation and what the future looks like for the dyspraxia community.
This is the subject of the first documentary podcast and video series under the previous brand of Neuro News with the Neuro News Stories with the first episode titled ‘Demise of the Dyspraxia Foundation: What does this mean?’ dropping at the end of the month with contributions from multiple voices within the community who have been interviewed for this episode with Jess Starns former of Dyspraxic Me, Janet Taylor former advisor for Dyspraxia Foundation and Alice Hewson former trustee of Dyspraxia Foundation. Further updates on this project are coming soon.
