Austin McDowell Foundation

Right now, children in every class in every school are struggling due to unknown, undiagnosed, unsupported visual difficulties caused by cerebral visual impairment or CVI. The children are lost in these classes; they all have the potential to learn and develop much more effectively, but only if they get the support they need. To get support, the children first need to be identified.

Dr Nicola McDowell was one of those kids. She knows first-hand the difference support makes. Nicola’s life is dedicated to reaching and helping children like her and she has developed an iPad App called the Austin Assessment, to do just that. The App is a simple fun game of matching cards, with built in measures to identify children. Through extensive published research, the App has been validated meaning it is accurate.

Nicola has set up the Austin McDowell Foundation to develop and run the App. The team at the Foundation are all contributing their time at no cost but need to raise funds to get the App into production. How many children? From research, in New Zealand, around 35,000 children are struggling because of CVI. In Australia 180,000, the UK nearly half a million, the US over 2 million.

We need to raise NZ$650k for the App and website which will provide the all-important support information for the children identified. Please help reach these children by donating.

News story on the App: https://www.1news.co.nz/2023/01/06/kiwi-develops-app-to-detect-common-visual-impairment-in-kids/