During Neurodiversity Celebration Week, Busy Bees Education and Training brought together a variety of different
speakers for a neurodiversity roundtable that aimed to look at just some of the
issues faced by neurodiverse people in the workplace. We wanted to better
understand the issues while also looking at how everyone can get better at
helping people to thrive and develop within their settings.
We were kindly joined by:
Helen Wilson – Science and
Communications Manager, Cognassist UK
Salwa Booth – Co-Ordinator,
Shropshire Autistic Adults Society
Tomas Higginson – The office of
Sharon Hodgson MP, APPG for Dyslexia and other SpLD
Jody Dean – Education and Quality
Manager, Busy Bees Education and Training
Jon Douglas – Director of IT,
Busy Bees Nurseries
Yvonne Brookstein – Head of
Inclusion, Busy Bees Nurseries
Catrina Lowri – Director,
Neuroteachers
Gemma Green – Area Team Leader,
Busy Bees Education and Training
Terri-Anne Fell – Digital
Marketer, Busy Bees Education and Training
Are schools adequately
preparing neurodiverse students for the workplace?
The roundtable began with a look
at whether education settings were doing enough to provide support to neurodiverse
students. It was agreed that students were not being prepared for independent
living and were almost being trained to be dependent on others for the rest of
their lives. Huge numbers of neurodiverse children are out of school, with
almost a million non-attenders. The group agreed that more must be done to
identify when children require support and that there was no reason this could
not happen on day one of education.
Salwa Booth, Co-Ordinator, Staffordshire
Autistic Adults Society, said: “I deal with young adults who have been
through the system. These are people with great brains and great thinking but
come to us under-educated and not trained for life skills. They are almost
trained to be dependant, rather than independent.”
Catrina Lowri, Director at Neuroteachers, said that “It is not
about just getting a job, it is keeping a job. We need to empower neurodiverse
people to have big conversations and set out their support needs to employers.”
Why do so many organisations
fail to hire neurodiverse workers?
Moving on to discuss why so many
organisations fail to hire neurodiverse workers, it was established that larger
organisations fail to organise and harness neurodiverse people effectively. In
many workplaces, the use of situational judgment tests in job application
processes sometimes cause trouble and distress for many neurodiverse people,
with the group agreeing that they should be scrapped to help in the job
application process. The group also agreed that the bill for universal screen
for neurodiversity, to help more people who may be neurodiverse discover this
and be able to seek support, was a great idea, and more should be done to
support it.
Tomas Higginson, from the office
of Sharon Hodgson MP, APPG
for Dyslexia and other SpLD, said: “This is a terrible problem we find. We’ve
heard a lot from testimonies that larger organisations fail to organise and
harness neurodiverse people. Situational judgment tests mean neurodiverse
people have to mask to a ridiculously high level. The APPG believes they should
be scrapped.”
How can we better educate
neurotypical people to support their neurodiverse colleagues?
The group discussed how
neurotypical people could better support neurodiverse people in the workplace. Many
people in the panel revealed how they almost had to explain to their employers
or colleagues what their neurodiversity was. It was mutually agreed that
neurotypical people should have some awareness training as to how to better
help neurodiverse people in the workplace.
The panel also discussed how
helping neurodiverse people should be a key part of the businesses, and that
someone in the business should have someone who is neurodiverse, or understands
them, to help them to be better represented in the workplace. However, it was
made clear that there shouldn’t be some blanket, cover-all method for helping
neurodiverse people, as they are all different, with different personalities
and needs from others.
Terri-Anne Fell, Digital Marketer
at Busy Bees Education and Training,
said: “It always does fall on the neurodiverse person to explain neurodiversity
to neurotypical people. On Job applications, it is normally written as ‘do you
have a disability' on the form and it is a difficult question. I didn’t refer
to myself as disabled as I don’t like to be referred to as a disabled person.”
Helen Wilson, Science and
Communications Manager, Cognassist UK,
said: “People in education are passionate about providing for neurodiversity
and understand this. There is a lot of people who also want to understand
this. People are going to get marked down in Ofsted if they fail to provide
adequate support for neurodiverse learners.”
Whilst support has come on a long
way in recent years for neurodiverse people within work and education settings,
this roundtable has made it clear that there is still a lot more to do to truly
help people.
Busy Bees Education and Training
are again supporting Autism Awareness Week this year, as we believe that there
should be no limit to individuals learning journey during their time with us.
We provide various methods of support to our learners, including a short
assessment prior to the beginning of the course, so we can get a better understanding
of how we can better help all of our learners. You can also access our Autism and SEND training courses, designed specifically for nursery settings here.
