Tiegan Blackhurst, Psychology, Lancaster University (2023 Cohort)

To honour Autism Acceptance Week, in April I organised an event to celebrate neurodiversity at Lancaster University (after organising this event I have a whole new appreciation for event planners… wow it’s a lot of work!. At first the task seemed quite daunting as I had an idea of what I wanted to do but was not sure how to make it a reality. The plan was to have a resources and services session (staff presentations about services they offer autistic students), a shared experiences session (members of the autistic community sharing their lived experiences of autism), and a research session (presentations from the psychology department about autism research at Lancaster).

The research session was the easiest to organise as I work with the other autism researchers in my department who were happy to get involved. The other sessions were harder to arrange as they involved liaising with people from different departments, administrative teams, and external speakers from other institutions. However, thanks to my partner charity Autistica advertising my event on their website and Lancaster University also sharing the event, members of the autistic community began to contact me to offer their lived experiences and I soon had enough speakers for the resources and services session. My favourite session by far was the shared experiences session in which we heard emotional poems, fascinating thought-pieces and moving monologues from members of the autistic community.

There was a real supportive atmosphere on the day and I am very grateful for all those who came to share their experiences with us. We had people travel from Blackpool, join virtually from all over the country, and had over 40 people in attendance (I did have a minor worry before we started that the only person who would attend would be my supervisor!). This event took a lot of planning (and even more emails…) but I am proud of how it turned out and would encourage anyone who wants to host/organise an event to give it a go!