Better Together – Starting Small and Getting Bigger! 

Kitty Eve and Joe Barton

Wednesday 19th June, 14:10-14:55

Bath Spa University would like to share their approaches and processes that have been developed along with other professional services and academic staff. We have identified several areas where disabled students are disadvantaged and have been working to ‘join up’ the thinking and support for disabled students across the University. We will outline the areas and services we have worked with to date and talk about the outcomes our collaborative approach has generated.

Kitty Eve

Kitty is the Disability Service Manager at Bath Spa University. Prior to this she was a primary school teacher for 25 years. 

Having started as a class teacher, her interest in disability began while teaching a Year 6 class who struggled to access the National Curriculum. She realised that the barriers of the curriculum combined with autism, dyslexia, dyspraxia and undiagnosed ADHD meant her class weren’t going to make the progress expected of them. This prompted a journey of discovery about disability…she is now a qualified SENCo (Special Educational Needs Coordinator) and has a PG Dip in Inclusion. She is also pleased to say that this class did go on to make and exceed the progress!

Kitty has been a mentor for trainee SENCos at Bath Spa University on the National Award for SEN Co-ordination (NASENCo), a statutory Masters level award for newly appointed SENCos in maintained schools.

She lectures about Inclusion on the UG Education degree at BSU and since officially becoming a member of staff in 2022 has provided training about disability and inclusion to academic and professional services colleagues. She is currently working with colleagues to develop a new open module exploring themes relating to disability, access, inclusion, and neurodivergence.

Joe Barton

Joe is a Disability Advisor at Bath Spa University, specialising in supporting autistic and neurodivergent students. In this position, as well as providing direct support to students, he has designed and facilitated AutWell, the Autistic Wellbeing Group in collaboration with Jorik Mol, specialist mentor, continued the Transition to University Programme, and provided training to academic and professional services staff.  

Joe’s lived experience of impairment and disability has informed his career. Before joining the university in 2022, he had a variety of roles working with disabled people, from wheelchair basketball coach to job coach. He also has a background in the academic study of disability, as he attained a Research Masters degree from the University of Bath in 2018 focusing on researching disability in higher education. This led to co-authoring a textbook on emancipatory and participatory research methods.  

Outside of work, Joe is a keen member of the Bath Romans Wheelchair Basketball Club, spends a lot of time in coffee shops, and appears unable to avoid collecting new diagnoses.