Home to the skylark - The Velux Foundations

BY THORKIL SONNE
for people with autism
in Poland
Thorkil Sonne (born 1960) holds an MSc
in surveying and is the father of three
children. He has worked in the field of
IT in the corporate sector for 20 years.
He founded Specialisterne and Specialist
People Foundation after his youngest son
was diagnosed with autism. He has been
awarded an Ashoka Globalizer Fellow-
ship.
Facilitating
employment
In 2010 the VILLUM FOUNDATION grant-
ed DKK 5,357,448 to the three-year project
“Specialisterne – Creating jobs for people with
autism in Poland.” The project will enable Spe-
cialist People Foundation, in association with
local partners, to establish a Specialisterne li-
cence partnership which will give well-func-
tioning people with autism spectrum disorder
in Poland a new opportunity to assess their po-
tentials on the labour market. Following posi-
tive assessment and subsequent training, people
with ASD in Poland will for the first time have
opportunities for meaningful and productive
employment where their special skills can be
turned into specialist capabilities. Specialisterne
Poland will break new ground as the first-ever
employment opportunity for people with ASD
in Eastern Europe and will as such become a
role model for Eastern Europe.
From left, Specialisterne Danmark consultants Christian Andersen, Morten Lolck and Trygve Rastad Bjørst working onsite
at the Specialisterne offices in Ballerup. Photo: Specialisterne
A personal background
Thirteen years ago when our youngest son Lars
was 2½ years old, he rejected the other kids in his
kindergarten class and seemed most comfortable
alone on the swing.
The staff at the kindergarten had great difficulties
with Lars. He was a nice child who never harmed
the other kids, but he would not take part in so-
cial activities. The staff recommended that Lars
should be observed by psychologists. After thor-
ough observation and assessment, the psycholo-
gists told us that there was no doubt that Lars
was affected by “infantile autism,” an incurable
lifelong pervasive developmental disorder.
We only knew autism from the Rain Man film –
but we found out that autism is much more than
what you see in this film. We learnt that around
1% of the population would qualify for a diagno-
sis within the autism spectrum – and we found
out that hardly any people with autism had a job
where they could use their special skills. Despite
their strong memory, structured mind, passion
for details and perseverance in repeating tasks
they were excluded from the labour market by
their lack of social skills.
With support from my family and a mortgage on
our house, I set out to create new opportunities
for people with autism and founded Specialis-
terne (The Specialists), a for-profit enterprise in
which well-functioning people with autism would
receive the understanding and support needed
to feel wanted and to excel. The company was
launched in 2004 in Denmark.
The Specialists in Poland
Specialisterne employs people with autism in our
business section as consultants working on valu-
able tasks like software testing, programming and
data input for the corporate sector. Our custom-
ers are large and medium-sized companies, and
have included many international companies.
In 2008 I gave a speech in Cracow at a software
94 FACILITATING EMPLOYMENT FOR PEOPLE WITH AUTISM IN POLAND VILLUM FOUNDATION 95
SOCIAL PROJECTS