Previously he taught at the Bridge Secondary site where he coordinated Relationships and Sex Education [RSE]. Tom's work has focussed on exploring representations of sexuality and identity for disabled people, leading to him developing training on the delivery of RSE for students with learning disabilities through the Bridge teaching school. Tom's work at the ILS has led to the development of highly integrated forms of support for the families that he works with, challenging the ways in which professionals position themselves within support networks, exploring how person centred models can be generated that empower young people and investigating how the voices of differently articulate people are accessed. Tom's research interests focus on developing a Neurodiversity approach within person centred teaching models, and challenging the dominant discourses around autism and the ways in which disability impacts on labelled people. Tom is currently involved in exploring the ways in 2 which anxiety mapping can be developed for work with young people positioned on the autism spectrum and the personal impact of participation in research.

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BackgroundService culture refers to the practices, views and values within service organisations. Developing positive cultures has been thought imperative to improving social care, though day services and their cultures remain an under‐researched area. For many autistic people with profound learning disabilities, day services are the sites at which they orientate their Monday–Friday adult lives and so service cultures are fundamental to the way they experience adulthood. It was thus the purpose of this study to explore day service culture through the perspectives and experiences of this group.MethodsThis study took a phenomenological approach involving extended participatory observations with an autistic person with profound learning disabilities at their day service, as well as broader ethnographic work within this context. Data was analysed through theory‐led thematic analysis.FindingsThe study found that autistic people with profound learning disabilities contribute their customs and values to service culture in everyday life and that space, time and place were important in this endeavour. It highlighted how these customs and values could be adopted or challenged by the service, its staff and their established culture.ConclusionIt is argued that positive service cultures are ones in which day services acknowledge and respond to the views and values of autistic people with profound learning disabilities. A potential framework is discussed to support services with this aim.