Abstract

The presentation will draw on data gathered during a two-year study investigating the impact of schooling and school exclusion on the mentalhealth and well-being of children (removed, 2020a; 2020b; 2020c). The original research involved 174 participants, including 55 children, 41 oftheir caregivers and 78 professionals from schools and health services. This study focuses on five caregivers interviewed during the originalproject, where the child had a diagnosis of autism and school exclusions. The research objectives were to determine the barriers and enablers tomainstream schooling for children with autism and to explore the emotional effect of the journey to school exclusion on the child and caregivers. Ethical approval for the research was granted from the University of Sunderland's Ethics Committee (removed, 2020a, 2020b, 2020c, 2020d).Gatekeepers provided consent for the caregivers to be approached and as per the British Educational Research Association guidelines (BERA,2018) voluntary, informed consent was sought and gained from all caregivers in the study.