ASID 2025 Conference

Learning from the Past, Shaping the Future

🗓 12 – 14 November 2025
📍Aerial Function Centre, Sydney, NSW

The theme for the ASID 2025 Conference is Learning from the Past, Shaping the Future. This conference marks the 60th anniversary of ASID and will be a partnership with Inclusion Australia, which celebrated 70 years of advocacy in 2024.

The 2025 ASID conference brings together a wide range of people interested in furthering the rights and improving the quality of life of people with intellectual disabilities. They include, researchers, advocates, policymakers, service providers, families and self-advocates with intellectual disabilities.

Over three days it will be a place to share new research, discuss ideas and hear about new service and policy developments.

The program will include research papers, policy commentaries, reports of lived experiences and accounts of innovative services.
There will be invited speakers and panel discussions as well as papers selected through the open call for abstracts.

The keynotes will consider:

    • interventions to support well- being of young adults with intellectual disabilities and autism
    • the progress of deinstitutionalisation

Why you should attend

The conference provides opportunities for learning and debate about old and new ideas about furthering the rights and social inclusion of people with intellectual disabilities .
The ASID conference provides a rare opportunity to get together and learn from others interested in ensuring people with intellectual disabilities have a good life.

Who attends the conference

  • Researchers
  • Policymakers
  • Service providers
  • Practitioners
  • Families and carers
  • People with intellectual disabilities

Speakers & Program

The conference will have streams on key topics like employment, health, criminal justice, parenting, housing and support, decision making and building inclusive communities. Attendees will hear about new ideas, learn from research, discuss contested policy issues, and share fresh thoughts. Everyone will leave with new ideas and connections to make a positive difference. 

Keynote Speakers

International experts will participate in the conference program:

Professor Kylie Gray is from Birmingham University in the UK.

Professor Jan Tøssebro is from Norway and studies how policies (rules and plans) affect people with intellectual disabilities. He focuses on making sure people live in homes, go to school, and have support in ways that include everyone.

Registration for the ASID 2025 Conference will open in January 2025