Strategic Plan 

We are delighted to share our Strategic Plan for 2022-2026.

This strategy builds upon the foundations of Amaze’s 50-year history of supporting the autism community in Victoria.

Autism is a lifelong condition and we are here for Autistic people of all ages.

Our strategic priorities for the next five years reflect the areas that we believe will have the greatest opportunity for impact for the community. 

We recognise our ambitions are significant and we don’t shy away from this.

Our plan highlights the importance of working in collaboration with others to achieve our goals. We believe we are stronger with a shared voice and that working together leads to greater shared success.

Our updated Strategic Plan outlines:

• Amaze’s updated Vision, Mission and Values,
• Amaze’s strategic priorities for the next five years, and,
• how we will measure our impact and outcomes.

Strategic Priorities

Our Strategic Priorities reflect the areas that we believe will have the greatest opportunity for impact for the community.

Cross cutting these priorities are the ongoing supports we provide to all Autistic people and their families at all ages, including those parts of our community who have complex needs or who may experience multiple forms of challenges or disadvantage.

Different parts of the community have differing needs and levels of engagement.

We will take a social justice approach to ensure the greatest effort is focused on those with the greatest need. 

Autism Assessment and Diagnosis

Having an autism diagnosis helps Autistic people to build self-understanding, identity, community connections and well-being.

We want all Autistic people to have access to timely and affordable diagnosis. An accurate diagnosis enables adjustments to be put in place so Autistic people can do their best at school, at work and in life.

We will focus our work on: 

• Increasing access to timely, affordable and accurate assessment and diagnosis
• Working with partners on innovations to build systems capability
• Advocacy to remove the age cap for Medicare rebates for autism assessment

Education and Training

A good education is the foundation for a good life. We want to see our early learning, schools, vocational and higher education sectors enabling Autistic people to thrive.

We will focus our work on: 

• Informing and monitoring implementation of Victoria’s autism education strategy and school disability inclusion reforms
• Improving autism inclusion in vocational education and training (in particular TAFE) as a major destination for many in our community and a critical pathway to employment
• Equipping our community with information and advice to enable self-advocacy in education systems.

Employment

We know that Autistic people overwhelmingly want to work and are an asset to the Australian workforce.

We want Autistic people’s needs and value to be recognised and supported by government, employers and employment service providers.

We will focus our work on: 

• Partnering with employers, employment service providers and governments to adopt an autism positive employment approach
• Connecting with other autism organisations to complement their existing efforts in autism employment
• Strengthening our systemic advocacy for policy settings that markedly improve employment outcomes for the autistic population.

NDIS

The National Disability Insurance Scheme (NDIS) provides lifechanging supports. Ensuring it works well for Autistic people, the largest participant group in the NDIS (around a third), will deliver significant benefits to the Autistic and broader Australian community.

We will focus our work on: 

• Keeping governments and the National Disability Insurance Agency (NDIA) informed about how the NDIS is working for our community and providing advice on improvements
• Equipping our community with information and advice to build confidence in accessing and navigating the NDIS
• Supporting those in our community experiencing multiple forms of disadvantage to access and use the Scheme

Health and Mental Health

Supporting the improvement of the health and wellbeing of the Autistic community is critical as it impacts upon every aspect of life.

We consider health from a holistic standpoint, recognising that there are many social factors such as income, nutrition, housing, physical activity and social inclusion that influence health outcomes.

We will focus our work on: 

• Promoting Autistic health and wellbeing through information, advice and connections
• Supporting health and community services to build autism accessibility
• Advocating for autism-informed mental health policy and programs, in particular the redesign of Victoria’s mental health system following the Royal Commission into Mental Health