Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps her Department is taking to support the early identification of neurodivergent conditions in students within the education system.

The department wants all children and young people, no matter what their Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) to receive the right support to reach their full potential.

Under the Children and Families Act 2014, mainstream schools and colleges must use their best endeavours to ensure that a child or young person who has Special Educational Needs (SEN) gets the special educational provision they need. The SEND Code of Practice is clear that meeting the needs of a child with SEN does not require a diagnostic label or test. Instead, the department expects teachers to monitor the progress of all children and young people and provide support where it is needed, including arranging diagnostic tests where appropriate.

To support all teachers in meeting these expectations, the department is implementing teacher training reforms. These reforms are designed to ensure that teachers have the skills to support all pupils to succeed, including those with SEND. Since 2020, the Initial Teacher Training Core Content Framework (CCF) has included content on adapting teaching to the strengths and needs of all pupils. The department is conducting a review of the CCF and Early Career Framework, which will consider further opportunities to improve how the frameworks support new teachers to meet the needs of pupils with SEND.

The department’s Universal Services (US) contract brings together SEND-specific continuous professional development and support for the teaching workforce to improve outcomes for children and young people. This includes autism awareness training and resources. Over 100,000 professionals have undertaken autism awareness training since the US programme launched.

The 2023 SEND and Alternative Provision Improvement Plan outlines the department’s vision to improve mainstream education by setting standards for the early and accurate identification of need, and timely access to support to meet those needs. The standards will clarify the types of support that should be ordinarily available in mainstream settings and practitioner standards will be developed to support frontline professionals. The first three practitioner standards will be published by the end of 2025 and will include one on autism. To inform this, analysts and policy officials keep under review all evidence-based good practice, including international evidence.

The 2021 Autism Strategy sets out the government’s ambition to make significant progress on improving early identification, reducing diagnosis waiting times and improving diagnostic pathways for all people, including children and young people. The Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC) is taking steps to improve access to assessments for autism. In 2023/24, DHSC allocated £4.2 million to improve services for autistic children and young people including assessments, pre- and post-diagnostic support, and the continuation of the Autism in Schools programme. Additionally, in April 2023, NHS England published a national framework to support the local NHS to commission and deliver autism assessment services for children, young people, and adults.

The department has not undertaken an assessment of the effectiveness of universal screening for neurodivergent conditions. However, from 2019, the department’s Opportunity Area programme invested £600,000 in a pilot to deliver earlier identification and faster assessment of autism, by connecting teachers and health professionals in schools. The pilot began in Bradford and was subsequently adopted by four other Opportunity Areas. The University of Manchester has been commissioned to evaluate the Early Identification of Autism Projects, and their report is due by the end of November 2023. Bradford’s Centre for Applied Education Research is drawing on the learning from the pilot to build and test a new digital tool to help Key Stage 1 teachers to identify and respond to learning and support needs of neurodivergent children in the classroom.