Darani Cumming

Darani Cumming is the Animal Assisted Learning Manager at Carbrook Centre, a Special Assistance School, and a founding Director of Transformed Futures, the not for profit company that governs the school. With more than 12 years of experience, she specialises in animal assisted learning and equine based education for students with complex needs. Her practice draws on trauma aware models, natural horsemanship, the Neurosequential Model in Education (NME), and Collaborative Problem Solving (CPS).

She holds a Graduate Diploma in Trauma Aware Education from QUT and is qualified as an EA Level One Vaulting Coach, EA Intro Riding Coach, and SSTA. Darani has trained two high performance vaulting horses for international competition and supported Australian vaulters at World Championships. She also volunteered as an OTC Coach at RDA Arundel Park and served on its management committee for four years.

Involved with horses since the age of three, Darani has competed across Pony Club, show horse, dressage and eventing, performed as a Senior Rider in the Spanish Dancing Stallions show, and trained in Classical Dressage with Nuno Olivera and Ramon Guerrero. She is the founder of ELLA Springs Vaulting Club, now based at Carbrook Centre, where she champions inclusive participation in equestrian vaulting. Her work is grounded in the transformative power of horses and the human–animal connection, creating meaningful opportunities for young people, horses and facilitators to learn and grow.

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Session Details

This session explores how equestrian vaulting supports neurosequential development in complex needs students through connection, rhythm, and movement. Darani Cumming demonstrates how horse partnership and patterned sensory input promote regulation, engagement, and readiness for learning, offering practical strategies for using vaulting as an effective, developmentally informed approach in special assistance education