If you’re passing through Guildford one night this week, you might notice the cathedral has turned blue.
Guildford Cathedral joins other buildings around the world in the light it up blue campaign to raise autism awareness.
We are very proud to support The Jigsaw Trust, a local charity which aims to improve the lives of those affected by autism through the provision of high quality, accessible, educational and wellbeing services.
This morning I attended an open morning at Jigsaw, as part of World Autism Awareness Day.
The open morning consisted of a couple of presentations; the first covered an explanation of autism and the second was about the history of the charity, along with news of some exciting plans for the future.
It was fascinating to learn more about autism. Throughout today, Jigsaw have been tweeting some of the facts they shared in the first presentation.
You can follow Jigsaw on Twitter at @jigsawtrust.
Between the two presentations this morning was a guided tour of the school.
This was a great opportunity to see the learning facilities and also learn more about how the Applied Behaviour Analysis (ABA) methods are put in practice.
ABA is a structured teaching programme built on a discipline devoted to the understanding and improvement of human behaviour.
Jigsaw is a CABAS® school; CABAS® stands for The Comprehensive Application of Behaviour Analysis to Schooling a research-driven system-wide approach providing individualised programmes for children and young people with and without disabilities.
Later this year, at the end of November, we will be organising and sponsoring the Jigsaw Run at Dunsfold Park for a third year. This 10k race and magic mile run aims to raise funds for the important work done at the Jigsaw Trust.
I’m also taking on a personal challenge in August to raise funds for Jigsaw. On 23rd August I will be running an entire ‘lap’ of the Isle of Wight coastal path.
At 106km (65 miles) the Isle of Wight Challenge will be my longest run to date and will hopefully encourage lots of people to make contributions for a very worthy cause.
You can make a donation online here.
