What ADHD and autism training actually looks like in UK schools
Seventy-six per cent had received “some training” in working with ADHD, autistic and neurodivergent pupils. That sounds promising until you examine what “some training” actually means.
Most received short sessions — less than half a day. Only 16% received training lasting a full day or more. The rest got one-off sessions, often years ago, sometimes bundled into general diversity training. One teacher described their neurodiversity training as “one afternoon as part of an LGBTQ+ presentation.” Another reported “1-2 hour INSET by outside agent in response to teaching a student with challenging behaviour.”
This is the reality behind the stated provision. When schools claim they provide neurodiversity training, this is what they’re providing. Brief, non-specialist sessions delivered years ago with no follow-up, no depth, no practical application.
The research from York St John University surveyed teaching and support staff across UK mainstream schools. What emerged wasn’t just inadequate training — it was the systematic abdication of responsibility dressed up as professional development.
Teachers identified the key challenges: time constraints preventing them from understanding individual needs, lack of resources, difficulties responding to diverse requirements. When asked what would help them feel more confident, the most common answer was simple: better training.
But here’s where it gets interesting. When researchers tested whether training predicted teacher self-efficacy — their confidence in working effectively with neurodivergent pupils — they found no relationship. Having received training didn’t make teachers feel more capable.
The wide variation in duration, scope and quality meant a simple yes/no measure couldn’t detect any effect. Some received comprehensive courses leading to qualifications. Others got an hour squeezed into existing diversity training. Both counted as “trained.”
Why contact with neurodivergent people beats training credentials
Self-efficacy ranged widely among the 177 staff surveyed. Some felt confident and capable. Others felt uncertain, under-equipped, overwhelmed.
Training didn’t predict this variation. But something else did.
Contact with neurodivergent people in daily life — both pupils at school and personal relationships outside work — predicted greater self-efficacy. Teachers who knew neurodivergent people as family members, friends, or colleagues felt more confident in their professional capacity to support neurodivergent pupils.
The quality of contact mattered most. Family relationships showed the strongest association with both self-efficacy and neurodiversity-affirming attitudes. Professional contact through pupils helped, but less than personal relationships outside the classroom.
This finding demolishes the institutional/procedural approach. Teachers don’t gain competence through checkbox compliance and brief training sessions. They gain it through actual relationship and understanding with neurodivergent people.
Nearly a quarter of respondents identified as neurodivergent themselves. They reported less stigmatising attitudes towards neurodiversity but were coping with work stress less well than their colleagues. Further evidence that neurodivergent people understand neurodivergence better than trained neurotypical professionals with minimal contact — but are simultaneously being ground down by the same systems failing their pupils.
The other predictor of self-efficacy? How well teachers felt they were coping with work stress. Not the level of stress itself — how well they were managing it.
This connects to what teachers actually said about their challenges. Not “neurodivergent pupils are difficult” but “the system gives us no time, no resources, no support to do this properly.”
What teachers really say about supporting autistic and ADHD pupils
One secondary school teacher: “I find that I am lacking in time to provide the high-quality individualised support that is expected and deserved. I see it as a priority therefore I have to cut back on other areas of my role, for example research and lesson planning in general. There is less and less support available due to budget cuts and fewer classroom assistants.”
A primary school teacher on uncertainty: “Not really knowing whether you’re doing things right, or possibly making things worse. Mistakes are an opportunity to learn, sure, but it’s a pretty poor deal for the person on the receiving end of the mistake.”
A SEN assistant describing a non-verbal pupil with challenging behaviour: “The other children don’t understand him and neither do most of the staff. We have had no training on supporting a child with his level of need — we have some idea what to do to support his academic development but no idea how to approach social skills, play skills or behaviour management with a pupil who appears to have no awareness of others and little understanding.”
A sixth-form teacher summarising the actual problem: “It’s not the neurodivergent children that are the problem but the lack of any real support for teachers and their neurodivergent students.”
That last quote is worth sitting with. Teachers are explicitly stating that the problem isn’t the children — it’s the absence of systemic support.
The rewards they identified tell the same story. Teachers described the satisfaction of witnessing student progress, building relationships, making a difference. A Learning Support Practitioner: “When you see a student progress over time and reach goals set. These goals may be very small steps. Seeing a student grow in confidence and overcome the barriers they face is very rewarding.”
This isn’t burnout causing resentment towards difficult pupils. This is professional commitment being undermined by institutional abandonment.
When schools claim neurodiversity support but deliver abandonment
Eighteen point four per cent of pupils in England were on the SEN register in 2024 (Department for Education). Autism accounts for the largest proportion of Education, Health and Care plans. More neurodivergent children are being educated in mainstream settings.
Meanwhile, exclusion rates for children identified with autism and ADHD are several times higher than their peers. A 2023 study (see citations) sampled 947 parents of children experiencing school distress severe enough to cause extended absence — over 90% were neurodivergent. Ambitious About Autism surveyed nearly 1,000 autistic young people aged 5-16 and found that one in six have stopped attending school entirely.
The pattern is familiar. Systems claim to provide support whilst offering teachers 1-2 hour INSET sessions then abandoning them to manage diverse needs with no time, no resources, and no follow-up.
This is the accommodation alibi in action. The stated policy exists. Legal frameworks mandate provision. Diversity officers tout commitment. But teachers receive brief, non-specialist training years ago with no practical application, then are left to work out complex individual support needs whilst managing increasing class sizes, attainment pressures, and competitive league tables.
The research found that contact with neurodivergent people — not training — predicted teacher confidence with neurodiversity in education. This reveals something crucial about how actual competence develops versus how institutions claim to develop it.
Real understanding comes from relationships. From sustained interactions. From seeing neurodivergent people as whole human beings rather than diagnostic categories requiring intervention protocols.
Institutions can’t mandate that through training sessions. They can’t procedurally generate it through checkbox compliance. So they offer symbolic gestures — brief training that lets them claim provision whilst delivering nothing that actually builds capability.
Teachers asked for consistent, high-quality training incorporating contemporary research alongside lived experience. They asked for time to understand individual needs. They asked for resources and staffing. They asked for whole-school approaches and better communication.
What they’re getting is 1-2 hour sessions bundled into diversity training, at best.
The gap between stated support and actual provision doesn’t just fail teachers. It fails the 18.4% of pupils on the SEN register who are being educated in mainstream settings whilst those settings refuse to resource what mainstream inclusion actually requires.
As long as accommodation remains individualised charity instead of structural design, both teachers and neurodivergent pupils will continue navigating inaccessible environments with inadequate support. That’s not inclusion. That’s abdication with an alibi. As per.
Citations
Hamilton, L. G., & Cook, A. (2026) — Supporting Neurodivergent Pupils in Mainstream Schools: A Mixed-Methods Survey of School Staff in the United Kingdom
Connolly, Constable & Mullally (2023) — School Distress and the School Attendance Crisis: A Story Dominated by Neurodivergence and Unmet Need
