About
Release Speech Therapy began while Director, Tara Cunningham was working as a Fundraiser for Down Syndrome Ireland. As she travelled around the country, she heard from countless parents of their relentless struggle to gain access to Speech and Language Therapy for their child. While driving down to Cork, Tara was in tears after a particularly challenging parents meeting. She asked her now husband, “Why doesn’t somebody DO something to help these people?” Luckily, Mark is an extremely supportive, wonderful man and asked her straight back, “Why don’t you do something?” Armed with determination to come up with a solution, the idea of Release Speech Therapy was born.
Tara realised that in order to facilitate the huge need, more Speech and Language Therapists (SLTs) were needed to be brought into the country, so as to increase rather than reallocate the number of SLTs in the country.
Tara also realised that the Irish Speech and Language Therapists were doing tremendous work, under extremely tight schedules and massive caseloads. Release needed to work with the Irish Association of Speech and Language Therapists to ensure we were aiding and supplementing their work.
Finally, we have to ensure classes are 100% focused on teaching the parents how to best work with their child on a day-to-day basis.
