About
Jackie Ryan is an Autistic autism researcher with a PhD in Rehabilitation Science from the University of Alberta. She holds a master’s degree in Leadership from Royal Roads University where her research on leadership to promote the self-determination of Autistic individuals won the University Founders’ Award. Her doctoral research was on understanding self-determination and autonomy from the perspective of Autistic adults with intellectual disabilities using a community-based participatory research approach. Included in her research was the preparation of Research 101 open-access training to build the capacity for Autistic people to collaborate in research. Jackie is continuing her self-determination participatory research by co-designing and evaluating a ‘toolkit’ of recommended practices based on the data from her doctoral research. Jackie is part of the Neurodiversity Movement and seeks to empower Autistic people to thrive.