At the Lovell Park Autism Hub next month, we've got a guest speaker in to talk about autism and equality at work.Janine Booth, a London-based autistic activist, poet and trade unionist will talk about her book, Autism Equality In The Workplace. Her talk will discuss topics like reasonable adjustments, retaining work and other issues like pay.The book, which was published earlier this year, includes personal accounts from autistic people about the problems they've faced in finding and keeping work. It also has examples of success in winning reasonable adjustments.Janine, a transport worker, is autistic herself and authored a guide to autism at work in conjunction with the Trades Union Council (TUC). She has given talks and performed poetry across the country and will be speaking in Leeds next spring.The talk will take place on Tuesday

20th September at the Lovell Park Autism Hub. It will begin at 5.30pm, with time for both questions and answers afterwards.The event is free to attend, but there is limited seating and standing space available. Priority will be given to autistic adults in the local area who want to see Janine speak.

For more information on her talk and what it will involve, please email us at leedsautismaim@advonet.org.uk. We promise to get back in touch with you as soon as we can.To find out more about Janine herself as well as her books, activism and poetry work, why not go and visit her website at janinebooth.com.

Leeds Autism AIM NewsThe quarterly newsletter for Leeds Autism AIM | Autumn 2016

Employment book talk at Hub

Leeds Autism AIM is a service providing Advocacy, Information and Mentoring to autistic adults in the Leeds area that get little or no funded support. We provide:

- The Lovell Park and Vale Circles Autism Hubs. Lovell is open every Tuesday from 1.30pm to 7pm and Vale every Thursday from 2pm to 7pm

- Info through the Autism Leeds directory, autismleeds.org.uk, as well as email/phone support- We have a group of mentors with specialist training who work can meet autistic adults regularly

one to one to help overcome barriers in order to reach their goals

Leeds has an IT skills gap, with companies struggling to fill roles. This could be a great opportunity for autistic people. Subject to enough interest, Herd Careers, in conjunction with Aspiedent, plan to run an autism IT jobs fair involving employers with roles to fill. As well as technical IT jobs like web design, programming and systems management, there is a wide range of non-technical IT jobs available like testing, project management and analysis. Why not visit the Herd website (www.herd.careers) to see

if there is anything that suits your skills and strengths?Are your technical skills a bit rusty? There are many free courses on coursera.org to help see if you'd re-ally enjoy this area of work. Why not produce and bring along something to show off to potential employers?If you would like to attend, please send an email to Jen Blacow at j.blacow@aspiedent.com, along with your CV and a cover letter detailing the kind of job you want. They will keep you informed and updated about the event.

IT OPPORTUNITIES FOR AUTISTIC JOBSEEKERS

Leeds Autism AIM is part of Advonet, a c harity whic h

provides a range of advoc ac y servic es

throughout Leeds. Find out more at advonet.org.uk

Making a point: Janine Booth speaking Pic : janinebooth.c om

From now on, Leeds Autism AIM News is now going to be run on a quarterly basis. However, we are in the process or setting up a new website just for our service.

We will let you know via social media when the site is finished. If you have any suggestions, for what should be on the new site, please email Luke at luke.aylward@advonet.org.uk.

G E T I N T O U C H : O N L I N E S O C I A LE M A I LP H O N E

We are looking at setting up a youth group at the Vale Autism Hub and would like your thoughts. If you're an autistic person in Leeds aged between 16 and 24, we want to know what you would like to do.There is a short survey where you can say what you think the group, run jointly with People Matters, should be about. There are only five questions to complete. To take part, you can find the survey at the following link:surveymonkey.co.uk/r/3GB8BNR

Leeds Autism AIM now have several new mentors fully trained and ready to meet with mentoring matches. There is a waiting list, but there will be training in place this autumn.Our next training course for anyone looking to become a mentor will take place at the end of September, finishing in the first week of October. Please message Flora or Wendy at leedsautismaim@advonet.org.uk if interested in becoming a mentor or in having mentoring support.

Advonet held a hugely successful stall at Leeds Pride on Sunday 7th August, advertising Leeds Autism AIM. Our stall, manned by Philip, Wendy, Luke, Trudi and Jonathan, saw a lot of interest from people about accessing our service.We would like to thank Leeds Pride organisers for giving us a stall and Time To Shine for setting up the quiet space. We would also like to thank BHA Skyline for letting us use part of their stall.

The Leeds Hidden Talents Employ-ment Fair, which took place in July, was a huge success. Around 250 people from across the city went there, with many hearing back from the exhibiting employers including Asda, Yorkshire Water and Carillion.Most of the feedback this year was positive from jobseekers and ex-hibitors alike. There will be another Hidden Talents fair next year, with the date, venue and exhibitors to be confirmed. Im-provements will be made in line with the feedback received.

There is still time to enter 30Ques-tions, Leeds Asperger Adults' (LAA) pub quiz fundraiser. The event, which takes place on Friday 9th September at The George pub, still has space available for a number of quiz teams.Leeds Autism AIM and Leeds ABC are among the local autism groups entering, with others still to confirm.For more details on the quiz, prizes and to download the entry form, please pay a visit to LAA's website at leedsaspergerblog.wordpress.com. Entry is £2 per team player with teams of up to six players allowed.

Specialist Autism Services (SAS) have revamped their website - specialistautismservices.org. On the new look website, you'll find info about all of SAS' services across Yorkshire, as well as regular news items and infographics about autism.The site isn't the only thing that SAS have changed; their new Twitter account has plenty of interesting autism-specific content including quotes and links to news items.If you have any thoughts about the new site, please share them with SAS by emailing them.

L E E D S A U T I S M A I M N E W S

A U T I S M N E W S I N B R I E F

H U B I N F O

Website: autismleeds.org.ukFac ebook: fac ebook.c om/ leedsautismaimTwitter: twitter.c om/ leedsautismAIMEmail: leedsautismaim@advonet.org.ukTelephone: 0113 244 0606Mobile: 0758 157 1380

youth group survey mentor training update advonet do leeds pride

hidden talents success time to enter laa's quiz new-look sas website

At the Vale Circles Autism Hub, we've got weekly support from Chapeltown CAB from 3pm to 6pm and fortnightly employment advice from 2pm to 7.30pm. For a timetable of events for Lovell Park, please visit our Facebook and Twitter pages. For further information on both hubs, check out the Autism Leeds website at www.autismleeds.org.uk.

N E W W E B S I T E C O M I N G S O O N