Our History

 

Abacus Learning Centre opened in 2008 when a group of parents and supporters shared an inspired vision to provide centre-based early intervention services for autistic children.

Our mission is to help autistic people to connect, communicate and learn by providing life changing therapy to young children aged 2-6 in their pivotal early learning years, where brain development is at a rapid pace and opportunities for learning are vast.  

Over the last 16 years, our life-changing service has helped more than 700 families, with students receiving one-to-one therapy, typically for two years. This is an intensive process using Applied Behavioural Analysis (ABA) that seems a lot like play for our students, who love Abacus.

The work we do not only impacts the student but it enables many families to see a future of work and community participation that they couldn’t imagine before. In fact, 90% of our students attend mainstream schools upon completion of our program and need less supports across their lifetime.   

When families find Abacus they are often feeling lost and in need of our help. They are always relieved to find someone who listens, often describing their first meeting with Abacus as a warm hug. We work hard to build a team around them to support their child. This includes our clinical team of Early Childhood Educators, Key Workers and Therapists who are overseen by an amazing senior clinical leadership group, including a registered BCBA practitioner. 

We regularly have students start with us who aren’t able to speak, but they leave Abacus talking, connecting, and enjoying life. This is capacity building for the future and we are hopeful of being able to continuing to grow our service to help many more families.

 

Abacus would like to dedicate this website to the memory of founding Abacus Director and parent, David Pink.