'Everybody's just thrown into it': teachers' perceptions of their roles in drug education in England

Background
Since 2020, drug education became compulsory in state-funded schools in England. Teachers play pivotal roles in drug education, but they receive little preparation, training and support. This paper explores teachers’ perceptions of their role legitimacy, role adequacy and role support in relation to drug education.

Methods
Utilizing findings from a wider evaluation of a multi-component drug education programme, this paper draws on semi-structured interviews with 17 teachers delivering drug education, 10 headteachers, and 8 focus groups or interviews with teachers (n = 45) in 11 schools in England.

Results
The teachers viewed drug education as a legitimate part of their roles and responsibilities, but did not feel adequately prepared to teach the subject. Although they expressed confidence in their classroom delivery skills, they felt inadequate in terms of their technical knowledge and expertise around different substances. Many of the teachers had not received drug education training prior to the programme. They gained confidence from and valued the external training and learning resources.

Conclusion
The findings highlight the interdependence between role support, role adequacy and role legitimacy for teachers delivering drug education and underscore the importance of specialist drug education training with regular updates, ongoing support and reliable signposting to trusted resources.

© 2026 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
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