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The CreateCATT team of global consultants and advisors
Bringing best practices to the children who need it most
Caroline Essame
CEO and Founder
Caroline is a British Occupational Therapist and creative arts therapist with a Masters Degree in education specialising in play-based learning. She has worked for over 35 years in the field of creativity and human development, with experience in health, welfare and education services in Singapore, Malaysia, Hong Kong, the UK, the Philippines and India. Based in Singapore she is the pioneer of CreateCATT Developmental Play and works with pre-school children and school-aged children with special needs as well as teaching at Singapore University of Social Sciences. She is a consultant for Deepti special school in Kerala, India, a Playfutures Explorer for the LEGO Foundation and an award winning international trainer and author.
Caroline Clay
Director of Operations
Caroline is an Occupational Therapist with over 35 years’ experience in disability, welfare, health, education and management. She has worked as a senior manager and has won a leadership award for innovative practice within health and social care. She works with children with extreme challenges in the UK, is a trained neuro-linguistic practitioner and sensory processing specialist. Caroline is Chair of the Candle for India Charitable Trust which supports special needs services in India and a global consultant with CreateCATT training across Asia.
Dr Andrew Duffy
Director of Communications
Andrew is the Director of Communications for CreateCATT, previously a tenured professor of journalism studies at Nanyang Technological University in Singapore he is now writes for children exploring the power of story as an agent for change. He has worked in communication for over 30 years, and has a PhD in communications and new media from the National University of Singapore. His undergraduate degree is in English from the University of Oxford, and he worked as a journalist and editor for 15 years.
Advisors, consultants and affiliates
Erica Neve
Erica has a background in education, design thinking and bio-leadership. Her practice embraces nature-informed regenerative methods to help people reconnect with nature, develop their wellbeing, knowledge, leadership, and skills. Erica serves on the board of The Eden Project, a global organisation that promotes public education about the natural world and is also the board adviser for AimHi Earth, a climate and nature education, communication and technology business that trains in nature and green skills. She is the business development consultant and impact advisor for CreateCATT and works with the company to minimize Nature and Nurture Deficit Disorder in the UK and across the globe through the model of Developmental Play.
Monaliza Guce
Monaliza is the Director and owner of Kaleidoscope Therapy & Learning Center. She is a licensed occupational therapist in the Philippines and Oregon, USA. For the past 20 years, Mona has devoted her career working with exceptional children and promoting inclusion of these children into our society, as an occupational therapist and early educator. She worked in Singapore for seven years and was the head of Early Intervention Programme for five years. Mona is currently pursuing her Ph.D. in Occupational Therapy and is involved with research into inclusion programmes and Developmental Play.
Dr Susan Mathew
Susan is the Director of Deepti Special School and Rehabilitation Centre in Kerala, India. She has a PhD in Theology from the University of Durham, UK, and is the mother of a child with cerebral palsy who was her inspiration for developing services for children with special needs and their families at Deepti, which started in 2009. Based in India, she teaches at the Department of The New Testament at Faith Theological Seminary in Manakala, Kerala, with a special interest in theology from a disability perspective. Susan has a Bachelors in Special Needs Education from India, and has been working for the past seven years integrating creative play and innovative integrated practices into the work at Deepti.
Ruth Barcelona
Ruth is a Digital marketing professional specialises in publishing, media / advertising and Loyalty. She has a Masters in Journalism and Communications and over 15 years experience focused on delivering results using consumer and market insights, technology and creativity in FMCG, travel, retail and education. She supports organizations that drive education, income and health to empower individuals and uplift communities in countries where she lived in the Philippines, US and Singapore. She is a marketing and communications consultant for CreateCATT, with focus in the Philippines and Asia.
Dr Suvi Pitkola
Suvi is a Finnish Occupational Therapist and Music Therapist based in Singapore. She is Director of Mighty Oaks Pre-School, the first Floortime School to be registered in Asia and also Co-Director of Kaleidoscope Therapy Centre. She has a Masters in counseling, the Advanced Level Certificate in DIR Floortime and a Ph.D. thesis on sound therapy and autism. Caroline and Suvi developed the first creative arts therapy network in Singapore in 2002, working on the launch of the Art Therapy Masters in 2004 and the first Creative Arts Centre for children with autism in Malaysia 2013.
Ying Li Looi
Ying graduated from RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia with a Bachelor of Arts in Professional Communication majoring in TV Production. She produces corporate videos for clients including Singapore Airlines, SingTel, Singapore Tourism Board (STB), Media Development Authority (MDA), British High Commission, SingHealth, Urban Redevelopment Authority (URA), Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports (MCYS) and Community Development Council (CDC). A scriptwriter, director and editor she mixes her interest in social media as a multi-channel tool to craft forward-thinking and creative productions and develops the online content for CreateCATT.
Barnaby Duffy
Barnaby Duffy is British artist raised and educated in Singapore who studied English (with film) at the University of Exeter in the UK. Illustrator of concept art and comic strips, with completed commissions ranging from professional companies to student magazines and previous work for a documentary crew . He is the animator and illustrator of all CreateCATT graphics.
Alex Bell
Alex has an extensive background in education, previously a Head Teacher in a top performing primary school in London and now the co-founder of a number of award-winning coaching based leadership programmes and social enterprises focusing on youth voice, psychological safety, organisational culture and purpose. His experience includes TED talks, working with UNESCO, the Barbados government and the Eden Project and his non-profit organisation has been named one of the top education innovations in the world. He brings his expertise in education to CreateCATT to co-create and build play based programmes for teachers.
Sue Allen
Sue Allen is a Children’s Occupational Therapist, postgraduate lecturer, clinical researcher and author. Based in Singapore her clinical work aims to increase participation in home, school and community environments and she specialises in working with families and children with developmental challenges. She is studying for her PhD at Reading University, Department of Psychology looking at mechanisms to support families of children with sensory processing and integration difficulties and she is also a published author of several books and articles. She was awarded the Sensory Integration Network (UK and Ireland) Fellowship recognising her contribution to the field.
Dr David Whitebread
David Whitebread was the founding Director of the Centre for Research on Play in Education, Development and Learning at the Faculty of Education, University of Cambridge, UK. His contribution as a developmental psychologist is widely recognized as a leading international expert in early childhood education. His research focused on self-regulation in young children, and the roles of play and oral language in its development and he is published widely in academic journals and book chapters on play-based learning. He was a great inspiration to the CreateCATT team and was the keynote speaker at the Ist International Developmental Play Conference in 2019.
Clive Essame
Clive Essame is the inspiration for much of the work of CreateCATT. Born with a disability he was a passionate advocate for life in all its diversity. A horticulturalist, a playwright and an artist he also worked with people with challenges through the arts and nature constantly bearing testimony to the tenacity of the human spirit and the right of everyone to creativity and play. As his sister I dedicate my social enterprise to his memory.
