NEURODIVERGENT ORGANISERS:
JANINE BOOTH

Janine Booth is one of the UK’s leading neurodivergent organisers.

For the last decade-plus, Janine has delivered training on autism and/or neurodiversity to individual unions, including PCS, NASUWT, Unison, GMB and RMT, and to cross-union bodies such as unionlearn and the Workers’ Educational Association, and to companies, non-profits and public bodies.

Janine is Red in the Spectrum’s founder and railway specialist trainer. She writes and delivers Red in the Spectrum’s courses.

Janine Booth is:

• an active trade unionist, who developed this training after being diagnosed as autistic in 2012
• also diagnosed with specific learning difficulties of a dyslexic type, and awaiting confirmation of ADHD
• author of ‘Autism Equality in the Workplace: removing barriers and challenging discrimination’ (Jessica Kingsley Publishers, 2016)
• author of the TUC handbook, ‘Autism in the Workplace’ (TUC, 2014)
• a former member and vice-chair of the TUC Disabled Workers’ Committee 
• Secretary of RMT Disabled Members’ Advisory Committee
• a lay tutor and former National Executive Committee member, RMT
• founder and Chair of Neurodivergent Labour
• a poet and editor of the NeurodiVERSE anthology

Janine’s relevant qualifications:

• Postgraduate Certificate in Autism and Asperger Syndrome (with Distinction) from Sheffield Hallam University
• Master of Arts in Women’s Studies from York University
• BSc (Hons) in Mathematics from Manchester University
• TQUK Level 2 Certificates in Understanding Autism and Understanding Specific Learning Difficulties
• Level 3 Award in Education and Training

Janine’s personal website is here.

NEURODIVERGENT ORGANISERS:
LIZ YEATES

For 25 years, Liz Yeates has been a community organiser and trade union activist. She spent 15 years working with looked-after children for a local authority and more recently returned to education where she gained a degree in Human Geography, her research including the geographies of disability, a relational social model of disability, and Non-Representational Theory as a tool for expanding neurodivergent geographies. 

Liz was part of a small group of activists in Leicester that launched Leicester Mutual Aid during the COVID crisis, providing an umbrella organisation for local mutual aid groups to share information, resources, and support. Liz wrote her dissertation on networks of solidarity during COVID.

Whilst employed by the local authority, Liz worked with autistic children and young people, developing self advocacy skills, and developing practices that include children with learning disabilities in the development of policy. Liz also sat on the authority’s heritage panel, on which she advocated for children with multiple and complex needs to have their social, psychological and cultural needs met.

Liz has previously worked in educational settings with excluded children and young people. She was the founder of Leicester Pride in 1999, which involved fundraising, event management and community organising. Liz is currently involved in community projects around sustainability and local food security.

Liz was diagnosed with Dyslexia in 2010, ADHD in 2018 and Autistic in 2019.

Liz brings experience, talent and social media expertise to Red in the Spectrum team of neurodivergent organisers.

NEURODIVERGENT DESIGNER:
LILIANA PAVIER

Liliana Pavier is a Bachelor in Fine Arts graduate of the University of the Arts London, now living in Manchester.

She worked as a graphic designer for non-profit organisation FUZE and now occasionally takes on freelance graphic design work on top of her day-job as an art teacher. 

Liliana is Red in the Spectrum’s graphic designer.

If you would like Liliana to do some design work for you, please email her at [email protected].