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The Onassis Foundation is supporting the operation of the Laboratory for Special Education and Family Counseling at the NKUA across 2022-2024

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A modern Laboratory for Special Education and Family Counseling is opening its doors at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA), funded by the Onassis Foundation. This donation is the culmination of a series of initiatives undertaken by the Foundation to improve the lives of persons with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), proving –once again– that culture is a matter of education.

Since 2012, the Onassis Foundation has supported children living with autism spectrum disorder, and their families too, by organizing a series of educational programs and arts events, and by running awareness campaigns designed to reach the broader public. The overarching aim of these actions has been nothing less that to create an inclusive world, free from discrimination. From the experiential “Music Loves Autism” program and the “One Little Window” music collection through to the “In the Heart of Autism” educational program and the “Boarding Pass for Autism” initiative, children, parents, and professionals working in the special education sector have been embracing difference and joining forces to forge an equitable society focused on the individual and their needs. This Onassis Foundation mission is being capped by the funding of a Laboratory for Special Education and Family Counseling at the NKUA – an initiative that is giving ever more children the chance to connect with their abilities and unleash their potential out in the world.

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Based at Hub 547 on the fifth floor of the School of Philosophy at the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (NKUA), the Laboratory for Special Education and Family Counseling was founded in 2016 with a dual mission: on the one hand, to bolster research activity around issues of concern for persons with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) and, on the other, to undertake clinical work with a view to comprehensively meeting the complex needs of children with ASD, and in particular those from vulnerable groups in society. The Laboratory also offers treatment services –such as special education approaches, behavioral therapy, speech therapy, and physical therapy– alongside educational programs for parents, as well as couples and family counseling. The course of treatment administered to each child, teen, or adult is tailored to their individual needs, at no cost to their families.

“Here at the Onassis Foundation, inclusion is a way of life. Across our educational programming, we seek to share the very latest scientific findings in easily understandable ways, and to spread this knowledge as widely as possible with a view to raising awareness within society, thus ensuring that diversity is considered a given. It is our hope that, at some point in the near future, we shall all live in a society that is accepting of difference – a society where a variety of resources and tools are readily available to all those who need them.”
— Efi Tsiotsiou, Executive Director and Director of Education at the Onassis Foundation

The Laboratory’s assessment and treatment services, select research activities, validated indices, teaching materials, and fit out –across the academic years 2022-2024– are being supported and/or provided by the Onassis Foundation.
Read more about the Laboratory

The love and gratitude we have already been shown by parents is, for us, the greatest possible affirmation that our work has value.

Angeliki Gena, Director of the Laboratory for Special Education and Family Counseling, and Special Education Professor at the NKUA

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