Local services for autistic children in East London have received a boost from BBC Children In Need.
Here at Sycamore Trust UK we'd been running our Way2Say Project in support of pre-school children with social and communication issues since 2004, but the project was threatened with closure in March 2018 due to the withdrawal of local authority funding.
However, BBC Children in Need stepped in to save the programme with a last minute injection of funds and not only will the project continue, it will also be available to a wider area.
Sycamore CEO Chris Gillbanks said “Children in Need have recognised the importance of the service and have agreed to fund a variation of the project called S.W.A.P. (Speak with a Picture). We are currently recruiting appropriate staff to work on the project and hope to be ready to launch this July.”
Thanks to Children In Need, Sycamore Trust UK will be able to improve the service by offering it to a wider area and the programme will now be available to families in both Havering and Redbridge as well as Barking & Dagenham.
For more information, please e-mail Lynn Chapman lynn.chapman@sycamoretrust.org.uk or call 020 8517 9317