You are here

  1. Home
  2. Conferences
  3. Conference 2015
  4. The history of self-advocacy in Oxfordshire and its impact on my life

The history of self-advocacy in Oxfordshire and its impact on my life

My Life My Choice

Funding from the Heritage Lottery recently helped us to produce a short user-led film called "Speaking up, speaking out, and speaking easy – a history self-advocacy for people with learning disabilities in Oxfordshire." As our presentation two of our self-advocates would like to show clips from this film and to also talk about the impact of self-advocacy on their lives. The film clips also include the views of support workers, families, and health and social care professionals. The self-advocates would also like to discuss how being part of the film and having their voice heard in this way has impacted upon them.

Biographies

Kevin Preen - Kevin has been a member of My Life My Choice since 2000. Kev is a passionate campaigner and dedicated to helping people who have a learning disability get equal rights in our society. To this end he has been a member of the national forum, supported the work of the Disability Rights Commission and, most recently, used his personal knowledge of living independently with support and mental health services in his role as Expert by Experience for the NHS England Care and Treatment Reviews. Kev lives in Abingdon with his cat Lucky.

Dawn Wiltshire - Dawn is the Co-Chair of the Trustees for the Oxford-based self-advocacy organisation My Life My Choice. Dawn's biggest passion is making sure that people who have a learning disability have a voice. She works hard to make this a reality and uses her position on the Learning Disability Partnership Board to make sure local and national decision-makers know what people who have a learning disability want and how they should make this happen. Dawn regularly works as an Expert by Experience and supported the Care Quality and Commission and NHS England to carry out national pieces of work. Dawn lives in West Oxford with support. She shares her home with her cat Star.

Contact us

About the Group

If you woud like to get in touch with the Social History of Learning Disability (SHLD) Research Group, please contact:

Liz Tilley 
Chair of the Social History of Learning Disability (SHLD) Research Group
School of Health, Wellbeing and Social Care
Faculty of Wellbeing, Education and Language Studies
The Open University
Walton Hall
Milton Keynes
MK7 6AA

About the website

If you have any feedback or would like to report a problem with the website, please contact WELS-Research-Admin@open.ac.uk.