User:David Andrews

David N. Andrews M. Ed., C. P. S. E. was trained in the psychology of teaching, learning & development, having been trained previously as a mathematics tutor in a further education college. He has experience of work in communication difficulties from internships at a special school, a further education college and in a medical physics & clinical engineering department. During his life in Finland, he has lectured and given talks in universities and research centres up and down the country, and was asked to design and deliver a training course to a group of people working in a provincial disability foundation research project.

Upon graduation from university, he commenced an internship as psycho-educational consultant for Autspect Education Tmi, after which he completed work placements with the national autism organisation and a local social psychiatry unit. David has published occasional articles on autism-related issues in Autismilehti and Good Autism Practice, amongst other journals. In addition, he was appointed Visiting Lecturer at his alma mater, whilst supervising and tutoring a Finnish student as well as conducting revision work for some of the university's teaching materials. He contributed a chapter to Dinah Murray's 'Coming Out Asperger', dealing with experience of mental health issues as a result of non-diagnosis: David is himself autistic, dyslexic and dyspraxic, having been assessed in Britain as being 40% handicapped "for all social contact, learning and expressions by speech and writing".

Despite these difficulties, David gained his degree of Master of Education from the University of Birmingham (where he specialised in autism issues), after which he pursued studies in educational & organisational psycho-anthropology/ethno-psychology* in a Finnish polytechnic (where he did his development project on understanding autism from a cultural perspective).

Before matriculation into the University of Birmingham, David managed to collect a respectable amount of study credit at a number of universities in both the UK and Finland, leaving the University of Oulu with accumulated study credit of 180 ECTS points: the equivalent study credit for a Bachelor of Arts degree. His subjects were applicable psychology (90 ECTS), mathematical sciences (45 ECTS), archaeology (30 ECTS) and Finnish language for beginners (15 ECTS), with his best results in applicable psychology. His M. Ed. degree (90 ECTS) was awarded with Distinction.

(* the distinction between the two is rather unclear, being at the interface of two or more disciplines)

Qualifications


 * 'Bachelor of Arts-equivalence -

Applicable Psychology: personality development & counselling; health psychology; social psychology; psychology of counselling/psychotherapy; neuropsychology; social, personality & clinical psychology; applied psychology; scientific philosophy/methodology; psychology of teaching & learning; thesis - "Mental Health Issues in Asperger Syndrome".
 * Major

Mathematical Sciences:
 * Minor(s)

Archaeology:
 * Subsidiary

Ab initio language: Finnish for Everyday Communication.


 * Master of Education - Special Education (Educational Psychology)
 * Autism (Adults) 1: Understanding and Working with the Continuum of Need
 * Autism (Adults) 2: Intervention, Care & Education
 * Special Study in the Psychology of Education 1: Psycho-Educational Assessment & Diagnosis
 * Special Study in the Psychology of Education 2: Professional Issues in Applied Psychology
 * Developmental Psychology of Childhood & Adolescence
 * Practitioner Inquiry in the Psychology of Education: Research Methods
 * Master's thesis: "What's wrong with this picture?", exploring the use of Galen Alessi's multi-level analysis in the development of a grounded theory based diagnosis.

(section to be completed)
 * Certificate of Professional Studies in Education