Shirley Foundation

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The Shirley Foundation, based in the United Kingdom, was established in 1996 by Dame Stephanie Shirley CH, who gave a substantial endowment to establish a charitable trust fund. The foundation ranked in the top 50 of grant giving foundations in the UK and was 'spent out' in 2018. [1]

Major awards have been given as follows: £15m has been given to the Worshipful Company of Information Technologists and the Oxford Internet Institute. Over £50m has been given for autism spectrum disorders. [2] [3] including setting up three charities: Autism at Kingwood founded in 1994 (support services); Prior's Court Foundation founded in 1999 (education) [4] and Autistica founded in 2004 (research) which together employ over 1,000 staff. The foundation also founded Autism Cymru charity (1999-2011); the All-Party Parliamentary Group on Autism (1999); the National Autism Project (2014-2019); [5] the National Autistic Taskforce (2017-); and supported the Patrick Wild Centre; Autism Together; The Autism Research Centre and many others (70 autism projects in total).

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References

  1. "Dame Stephanie Shirley". www.philanthropy-impact.org. Philanthropy Impact. Retrieved 26 April 2018.
  2. "The Shirley Foundation funds online community for autism research". www.campaign.ox.ac.uk. UK: University of Oxford. 3 March 2016. Retrieved 26 April 2018.
  3. Jones, Hannah (7 May 2008). "Interview: Dame Stephanie Shirley, philanthropist". www.thirdsector.co.uk. UK: Third Sector. Retrieved 26 April 2018.
  4. "Dame Stephanie Shirley". www.priorscourt.org.uk. UK: Prior's Court School. Retrieved 26 April 2018.
  5. Ragan, Ian (October 2015). "The National Autism Project: aims and objectives". Good Autism Practice. 16 (2): 5–10.