Including disabled and neurodivergent people

At Scouts, we want everyone to join in and have fun. Our activities, badges, awards and programmes are flexible to meet people’s needs. Explorers and Network members with learning disabilities can take part in Mencap's Gateway Award as part of their Scout Top Awards.

Disabled people understand their needs best. When putting support in place, our volunteers listen to, and are guided by, the disabled person and their parents, carers or helpers, when putting support in place.

Reasonable adjustments are changes we can make to help people join in. We’re required by law to make these changes for young people. 

We say ‘disabled people’ because we use the social model of disability. This means we believe it’s not a person’s disability that creates barriers, but the way society is set up. We want to remove or reduce those barriers. We include neurodivergent people when we talk about disability at Scouts. 'Neurodivergent' describes someone whose brain develops or works differently from what is seen as ‘typical’. This includes autistic and dyslexic people, people with ADHD or OCD, and many other developmental or neurological conditions. Some neurodivergent people may describe themselves as disabled, while others may not.

Check out our Supporting Neurodiversity four-part web series and our visual support resources, created in collaboration with Widgit, to help our volunteers make Scouts more inclusive for neurodivergent young people.