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Do you work in a mainstream secondary school in the North East or North Cumbria?

We are looking for teachers and other school staff, who work within mainstream secondary schools in NENC, to complete a 15-20 minute anonymous, online survey. This survey will help us to understand:

• Training and information school staff are able to access, to support them in working with pupils with autism.
• Barriers and enablers to taking part in autism-focused training from a staff perspective (e.g. lack of available time, workload etc.).

Participants will not be asked to provide the name of their workplace and it is fine if you have minimal or no past training and/or experience in this area.  We are particularly interested in hearing from those without SENDco experience.

More detailed study information and the survey can be accessed by following this link

If you have any questions please contact Dr Angela Wearn ([email protected])

More about the project

Project Title: Developing inclusive school environments: Optimising the provision of staff training to support positive mental health in autistic young people.

What is the purpose of the research?

Past research has found that mental health of autistic young people often declines in adolescence. Previously, autistic young people have told us that staff training can have a big impact on their mental health and wellbeing. However, there can be challenges for school staff in engaging with such training.

This study aims to explore what (if any) autism-focused training, information and support is currently available to mainstream secondary school staff across the region and understand factors that influence the uptake of this training, from a school staff perspective.

We use the term ‘Autism-focused’ to refer to any training that is directly related to learning more about, or raising awareness of, autism and/or autistic individuals’ needs.