ACRE was developed to address the gap in provision for autistic adults in terms of employment, and to facilitate job retention by developing tools to support employers in the process of making work adaptations tailored to their autistic employees.
In an interview for Autism Awareness month, undertaken by the Autism Centre for Research on Employment, which was recognised by the National Autistic Society with the award for Outstanding Adult Services in 2016.
Our mission and values
ACRE works to empower and support autistic people to realise their full employment potential. Specially we aim to:
- Promote the rights of autistic people to contribute to our society
- Enable the provision of personalised support tailored to their individual strengths and needs
- Strengthen our commitment to the regional, national and international community
Our services
Autisms Employment Toolkit
The Autism Centre for Research Employment (ACRE) focuses on conducting employment research and developing services to improve the job opportunities of people on the Autism Spectrum without, or with mild, learning disabilities. The Autism Employment Toolkit aims to introduce you, or the person you support, to the most relevant issues you need to know about when preparing, looking or staying at work.
Employer training
We provide specialist training to professionals from employment agencies, local authorities and charitable organisations. The training provided can be tailored to the particular organisation but will always be based on the best evidence research practice available as well as providing practical tips for supporting this population.
We also provide person-centred training to employers with the aim to create a supportive and productive working environment, and help to overcome any potential challenges that may arise in the initial stages of employment.
If you would like to apply for our services or receive more information, please contact us by email at Beatriz.Lopez@port.ac.uk.
Research projects
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Experiences of neurodivergent staff at Higher Education
Research shows that when adequately supported, neurodivergent (ND) staff positively contribute to HEIs in numerous ways. Regrettably, there is robust evidence neurodivergent staff face a series of barriers at HEIs including stigma, lack of understanding and lack of tailored accommodations. These barriers result in unnecessary performance reviews, redundancy, exclusion and poor mental health in neurodivergent staff.
The aim of this project is to investigate the experiences of ND staff at university. Specifically, the project aims to explore experiences of disclosure, implementation of adjustments and acceptance.
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Supporting autistic students through university using a collaborative participatory research approach
Despite various academic and personal strengths, autistic university students are at high risk of dropping out of their studies, resulting in low employment rates and unfavourable job conditions for autistic individuals.
This project uses a participatory approach which includes autistic students and community members as equal partners throughout the research process. The aim if to help us identify the support needs of autistic students at university.
Unlike other studies, non-autistic students will also participate as research partners to identify training needs for the non-autistic community of university students.
Selected publications
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Lopez, B., Kargas, N., Udell, J., Rubin, T., Byrgess, L., Drew, D., McDonald, I., O'Brien, A., Templeton-Mepstead, K. (2021) "Evaluation of the ACE employment programme: helping employers to make tailored adjustments for their autistic employees", Advances in Autism
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Mac C谩rthaigh, S., Lopez, B. (2020) "Factually based autism awareness campaigns may not always be effective in changing attitudes towards autism: evidence from British and South Korean nursing students", Autism
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Raymaker, D.M., Sharer, M., Maslak, J., Powers, L.E., McDonald, K.E., Kapp, S.K., Moura, I., Wallington, A.F., Nicolaidis, C. (2023) "鈥淸I] don鈥檛 wanna just be like a cog in the machine鈥: Narratives of autism and skilled employment", Autism
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Azevedo, F., Middleton, S., Mai Phan, J., Kapp, S.K., Gourdon-Kanhukamwe, A., Iley, B., Elsherif, M.M., Shaw, J.J. (2022) "Navigating academia as neurodivergent researchers: promoting neurodiversity within open scholarship", Association for Psychological Science
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Cheriyan, C., Shevchuk-Hill, S., Riccio, A., Vincent, J., Kapp, S.K., Cage, E., Dwyer, P., Kofner, B., Attwood, H., Gillespie-Lynch, K. (2021) "Exploring the career motivations, strengths, and challenges of autistic and non-autistic university students: insights from a participatory study", Frontiers in Psychology
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Waisman, T.C., Williams, Z.J., Cage, E., Santhanam, S.P., Magiati, I., Dwyer, P., Stockwell, K.M., Kofner, B. Brown, H., Davidson, D., Herrell, J., Shore, S.M., Caudel, D., Gurbuz, E., Gillespie-Lynch, K. (2023) "Learning from the experts: evaluating a participatory autism and universal design training for university educators", Autism
