My project - ASD coworking center

[Aleksandar]

Dear friends,
I would like to talk with you all about my future project - a specialised coworking center for ASD's persons in Belgrade, Serbia.
I'm sure you know what happened here in exYugoslavia during 90's, no one can imagine what hell passed autistic people.
After all that chaos, no matter if they living in Belgrade, Prishtina, Sarajevo or Skopje, autistic people are abandoned from societies, no chance to get a job.
No matter on the nation or the religion, we are one family,we should help eachother and my project is going in that way.
I shall continue to fight, I'm sure I shall do it well with my project same as it was with Specialiterne, Auticon and other ASD friendly companies.
Main aim of the future coworking center is a life improvement of the local ASD people and boosting their creativity and talents.Main activity will be to provide a space for ASD's freelancers and startups, but there will be also next activities:
- workshops for ASD's kids,
- legal aid, especialy in the case of the discrimination,
- educations and training in various fields(ITC, art, crafts, foreign languages etc.)
- coaching of ASD's people about various topics(health,relationship,career,etc.)
Even this is a localy oriented projected, this is only a begining, I'm sure in a future there will be thousands of similar coworking centers around the world.
Whole project will start almost from nothing, I have around 300usd prepared for it, a funding target will be 50 000 usd.
I shall start a campain on the crowdfunding websites, but also i hope that Specialiterne and other companies foundations would join too.
Before all of that, I would like to hear your opinion, you are free to give critics and suggestions.
All you, those who are a project managers or have an expirience with making projects, are welcome to help me about project draft.
Also all of you who are good in video production, it would be good to create a short video about this project.
When the campains being started, I hope all of you will help with online promotions on social networks.
We ASD's people are a big family worldwide, no matter where we are living, we have same problems.
We have to be united and help eachother.
Respect to all of you.
Aleksandar.

 

[Kate McG]

Hi Aleksandar,

I completely agree with your post. If I could have a dream 5 year plan, it would be to do exactly your proposal here.
Do you have a Facebook page or anywhere I could keep updated with your project?
I'm currently a medical researcher specialising in autism and have volunteered in countries like this and have had the same thoughts regarding ASD and other disability needs.

Thanks.
Kate.

 

[Aleksandar]

Kate,
thank you for the answer. The project is now on the stage of the draft, I still working about it, it's all written on my native language - Serbian.
When I finish, I shall translate it on English and other languages.
I hope whole project could be fullfilled in 1-2years.
In my previous posts I gave main direction of project, but let me be more detailed.
Imagine one coworking center, same as many around the world. Most of them are oriented about IT, enabling IT freelancers to work together, organising meetups and so.
This will be about the autism from different viewpoints, from education and human rights till employment and relationships and the autism from different ages, from the childhood till the old ages.
In begining I was thought that the center be a space for ASD IT freelancers and startups, but again I asked myself, why not legal aid?
Even the discrimination by the illness is punished, it's not easy to proved. Here in my land we had an incident in the kid's puppet theater, the mother with autistic 8-year old boy was expelled by the security officer, who told them that the boy made a noise by laughing...maybe that boy should cried?
Then I asked myself, why not coaching service? It's known that ASD people has a problem with the aproach to other people, especialy in seeking job, so if they have some self-confidence training, they can overcome. Also to reconsider with them what is a best job for them, some jobs aren't proper for ASD people, some are an excellent for them.
Then why not free education? I mean on short courses, also alumni for ASD students, where ASD person who graduated on the master level, will be the mentors to the new generations of the students.
Finally, why not various workshops for ASD kids? For examples, foreign culture and languages, where native Brasilian will present their country and culture to kids and also to teach kids to basic word on Portoguese. Here in Fryday will be a presentation of using robots in teaching of ASD kids by an robotics company.
I'm sure there are many other options, whose can be a part of this project.
You and other are free tell mewhat you'd changed in this project, also you can join in it.

 

[Kate McG]

Wow. What a great plan you have.
I am a woman with aspergers and I find even in the UK there are no support services for high functioning adults let alone women. As I believe the experience of autism is different between genders.
Also, do you mean education to people who don't have ASD, to raise understanding of the condition and promote acceptance?
Alumni is a great idea, proving that people with ASD can, (and have), achieve anything.
I would very much like to keep in contact with you, I have not finished my PhD yet, but it sounds very much like something I would love to be involved in.

 

[Aleksandar]

Just to know, you already involved yourself into.
For the people, who dont belong to ASD, we shall organise Open Day, one day in the month, when the doors of the center will be opened and when will be presented all achievements of the center.
With all positive examples, any society will get a strong message how much ASD people are important for any society.
Just your head up and continue to work on your PhD, when you are finish and defend it, we all should proud on you
Well done.

 

[Silverwhistle]

Wow. What a great plan you have.
I am a woman with aspergers and I find even in the UK there are no support services for high functioning adults let alone women. As I believe the experience of autism is different between genders.
Also, do you mean education to people who don't have ASD, to raise understanding of the condition and promote acceptance?
Alumni is a great idea, proving that people with ASD can, (and have), achieve anything.
I would very much like to keep in contact with you, I have not finished my PhD yet, but it sounds very much like something I would love to be involved in.

Hi! Where are you? There is an Adult Autism Centre here in Glasgow, and I've been attending a post-diagnosis group for women. What we are hoping is perhaps being able to get something going on a more regular basis.

 

[toothless]

Kate,
thank you for the answer. The project is now on the stage of the draft, I still working about it, it's all written on my native language - Serbian.
When I finish, I shall translate it on English and other languages.
I hope whole project could be fullfilled in 1-2years.
In my previous posts I gave main direction of project, but let me be more detailed.
Imagine one coworking center, same as many around the world. Most of them are oriented about IT, enabling IT freelancers to work together, organising meetups and so.
This will be about the autism from different viewpoints, from education and human rights till employment and relationships and the autism from different ages, from the childhood till the old ages.
In begining I was thought that the center be a space for ASD IT freelancers and startups, but again I asked myself, why not legal aid?
Even the discrimination by the illness is punished, it's not easy to proved. Here in my land we had an incident in the kid's puppet theater, the mother with autistic 8-year old boy was expelled by the security officer, who told them that the boy made a noise by laughing...maybe that boy should cried?
Then I asked myself, why not coaching service? It's known that ASD people has a problem with the aproach to other people, especialy in seeking job, so if they have some self-confidence training, they can overcome. Also to reconsider with them what is a best job for them, some jobs aren't proper for ASD people, some are an excellent for them.
Then why not free education? I mean on short courses, also alumni for ASD students, where ASD person who graduated on the master level, will be the mentors to the new generations of the students.
Finally, why not various workshops for ASD kids? For examples, foreign culture and languages, where native Brasilian will present their country and culture to kids and also to teach kids to basic word on Portoguese. Here in Fryday will be a presentation of using robots in teaching of ASD kids by an robotics company.
I'm sure there are many other options, whose can be a part of this project.
You and other are free tell mewhat you'd changed in this project, also you can join in it.

hi aleksandar,
my support staff;helen massey roche started her organisation acorn treatment from nothing apart from her own experiences,
you can succeed like helen.
i think you are awesome for what you want to do and so does helen who is sat with me now.
helen says you might be able to access funding from european social fund money,helen got over a million pound from that over a period of 3 years.

have you thought about adding some social skills and communication skills classes? what about teaching basic living skills such as cooking and cleaning as well for the less functioning individuals?
you could have a support group for autists so autists can get their issues out,thats very handy.

 

[Aleksandar]

Hello,
thank you for your opinion. This is something what should go in a few steps.
Same as a building of skyscrapers, we should make the strong fundaments, then we make make the floor by the floor.
About less functial autistic persons, we have a problem here on Balkans. When the family found out that some kid has the autism, they know to send him/her in institutions. On other side, if they decided to care about them, they treating them as a vegetable.
In both cases, less functional autistic persons are isolated from society, because there is still a stupid opinion that having mentaly ill person in the family is not good for the reputation.
That opinion is changing,but very slowly.
I shall search on Google about acorn treatment, we shall keep in the touch.

 

[Aeolienne]

I shall continue to fight, I'm sure I shall do it well with my project same as it was with Specialisterne, Auticon and other ASD friendly companies.

Specialisterne didn't do so well with their first UK office: Autism firm closes after two years
It would be nice if there were autism-friendly employment initiatives for fields other than IT. Just sayin'.

 

[Victoria StJohn]

Hello Aleksander, I hope to be able to get in touch with you to see where you have gone with your project. I would be very interested in speaking with you as I am designing exactly that right now! You can reach me at my email or my cell.
Hoping this reaches you, Regards, Victoria

Dear friends,
I would like to talk with you all about my future project - a specialised coworking center for ASD's persons in Belgrade, Serbia.
I'm sure you know what happened here in exYugoslavia during 90's, no one can imagine what hell passed autistic people.
After all that chaos, no matter if they living in Belgrade, Prishtina, Sarajevo or Skopje, autistic people are abandoned from societies, no chance to get a job.
No matter on the nation or the religion, we are one family,we should help eachother and my project is going in that way.
I shall continue to fight, I'm sure I shall do it well with my project same as it was with Specialiterne, Auticon and other ASD friendly companies.
Main aim of the future coworking center is a life improvement of the local ASD people and boosting their creativity and talents.Main activity will be to provide a space for ASD's freelancers and startups, but there will be also next activities:
- workshops for ASD's kids,
- legal aid, especialy in the case of the discrimination,
- educations and training in various fields(ITC, art, crafts, foreign languages etc.)
- coaching of ASD's people about various topics(health,relationship,career,etc.)
Even this is a localy oriented projected, this is only a begining, I'm sure in a future there will be thousands of similar coworking centers around the world.
Whole project will start almost from nothing, I have around 300usd prepared for it, a funding target will be 50 000 usd.
I shall start a campain on the crowdfunding websites, but also i hope that Specialiterne and other companies foundations would join too.
Before all of that, I would like to hear your opinion, you are free to give critics and suggestions.
All you, those who are a project managers or have an expirience with making projects, are welcome to help me about project draft.
Also all of you who are good in video production, it would be good to create a short video about this project.
When the campains being started, I hope all of you will help with online promotions on social networks.
We ASD's people are a big family worldwide, no matter where we are living, we have same problems.
We have to be united and help each other.
Respect to all of you.
Aleksandar.