About us
The Sheila Coates Foundation was registered as a charity in 2020 with the aim of advancing the education and mental health of children and young people in England who have autism and related conditions.
The late Sheila Coates was an inspirational creator of a service in Oxfordshire for children with autism and related conditions. She led a team of more than 90 staff working with 200 children in many host schools.
As a friend wrote in Sheila’s obituary in 2010:
"The philosophy which she engendered by her example lives on: respect and caring for each child and each family, combined with a realism about their difficulties, a willingness to explore new ideas; developing the service to address the daily reality of the children's problems; and giving staff freedom to develop their own initiatives."
Our founder, a very successful fintech entrepreneur, benefitted from attending a resource managed by Sheila Coates some twenty years ago. In her memory, he has established the Sheila Coates Foundation. Through the Foundation, he wants to help young people with autism to be given every opportunity to achieve their potential and thrive amidst mainstream society.
In his own words:
"I never saw my diagnosis as a ‘label’ in any negative sense. I viewed it essentially in terms of the benefits it could yield, such as access to resources that would help me be understood, firstly, and then to succeed in school and in life. I want as many children as possible to have these resources, and that’s what the Sheila Coates Foundation is for."