The Autonomous University of Madrid has hosted the International Seminar on Museums and Autism: Experiences, in which the CV MARQ Foundation participates with the exhibition of the programme it develops to integrate in the Museum and in the Archaeological Sites owned by the Provincial Council of Alicante the visit of people with autism. The head of the Didactics and Accessibility Unit of the Foundation, Gema Sala, has participated in a round table with experts from museums and national and international cultural centres in which she has exposed the work developed in the MARQ for the inclusion of people with autism spectrum disorder.
Since 2013 the Fundación CV MARQ has been programming activities for people with autism in collaboration with ASPALI, Asociación Asperger Alicante-TEA. An example of this synergy has been the programme Guide for 1 day at MARQin which, during a day, people with autism act as guides of the Museum for their families and relatives.
Besides, and with the aim of socialising young people with autism during their adolescence, the CV MARQ Foundation promotes several initiatives to bring the museum, the archaeological sites, archaeology and history closer to young people with autism between 9 and 13 years old, so since November and until next July it has started the programme Empower Parents in which six young people from Alicante with autism and their families participate.
This programme, which stems from an experience carried out at the Queens Museum in New York, develops and researches models of intervention with people with autism, using our museums and cultural centres as a tool for formative and socialising inclusion. In this case, the MARQ becomes a laboratory in which to experiment new accessibility practices and resources that guarantee the enjoyment and autonomous visit to people with autism and their families.
This programme consists of 8 experiential sessions, every Saturday, in which the team of didactic educators of the MARQ Foundation and the families, together with the people with autism, work to try to humanise processes and transform the museum into a common space in which they can meet, talk, dance and also enjoy culture, as well as share experiences and establish links between them.
