Bandar Seri Begawan - SMARTER Brunei's dream of having its own permanent and bigger centre might take a while to achieve but they came closer to fulfilling their dreams yesterday with a B$10,400 donation from committee members of the religious school leaders in the Brunei II area or JKPSSU KBII

SMARTER stands for Society for the Management of Autism Related issues in Training, Education and Resources. Build by the patients' parents; it pioneered the nation's first dedicated centre for autistic children and community in Brunei.

The donation was handed out by the Chairman of JKPSSU KBII, Cikgu Zulkifli bin Hj Puteh to the wife of the SMARTER Treasurer, Maslinawati bte Hj Lamat.

The money was derived from recent charity walkathon organised by KKPSSU KM!, in which five per cent of the total net amount collected was donated to the centre.

The committee also donated another five per cent to Pengiran Muda Al-Muhtadee Billah Fund and five per cent to the JKPSSU Welfare Fund.

Obtaining its own and much bigger premises might be a tough challenge for the centre as it is heavily funded through public donations but SMARTER is no stranger when it comes to challenges after having conquered many difficulties in the past.

The centre sprung to life when a group of parents gathered to experiment with establishing a fully dedicated centre for their autistic children in the country. They eventually achieved their goals in November 2001 through public donations and government assistance.

From day one, its student population has increased as the number of newly diagnosed children by the Child Development Centre is on the rise along with some of the students reaching their teens and into adulthood.

In just a short span of time, the centre, which is almost entirely funded by donations, has reached many milestones and with its unique programmes, fundamental and structures, it is recognised internationally and earned praises all over the world.

It also holds an annual national conference on autism and envisions Brunei as a "Autism Friendly Nation". SMARTER, today needs more space and bigger facilities and with that, a more improvised structure can be implemented.

The centre said it is important to achieve this goal, because autistic children by definition are a special category, where autistic individuals have the potential to live life independently with proper training. In fact some have the potential to reach greater levels of achievement. Some of the known icons that were thought to have autistic backgrounds are the likes of famous genius such as Albert Einstein, world-renowned businessman and billionaire Bill Gates, acclaimed sportsman like Ian Thorpe and prominent actor, Sylvester Stalone.

There are still many who have achieved higher levels of academic qualification and sophistication.

The public are most welcome to contribute to help SMARTER in getting their own permanent and bigger centre through the 'SMARTER Brunei building fund' at HSBC Bank.

"We welcome the continuous support from the caring public for SMARTER to achieve the vision of becoming an Autism friendly nation," said Hj Yusof Thani Dato Hj Hussain, one of the parents dedicated to work voluntarily for SMARTER.

Some parents have also sacrificed a lot for the centre and are motivated by their own patients to see its success.

"In order to achieve the vision of being 'Autism friendly nation', various long term and short term strategies are in place to ensure that individuals with autism are able to prepare themselves to live independently in the future."

In conjunction with the donation, members of JKPSSU KBII also took the opportunity to visit SMARTER Brunei Centre, where they were briefed on more details regarding the functions, vision and teaching methods. They also took their time to tour the premises. -- Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin

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ian thorpe autistic?
written by jeff gustavson , July 06, 2009

i never heard that before...

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