Ms Anne Tansey:

On the role of the National Educational Psychological Service, NEPS, the focus of the Department of Education and Skills in supporting well-being is through an early intervention and a preventive role. We set up a system in schools where all of the teachers are supportive of the children in that school system. Our role in that is supporting schools to do that. The way services are organised means the provision of therapy is the responsibility of the HSE and not the Department of Education and Skills.

Some of our educational psychologists, however, are trained in a broad range of therapeutic interventions, such as cognitive behaviour therapy, solutions-focused therapy or person-centred approaches. As part of their work, sometimes, psychologists engage in a small amount of therapeutic interventions. When it does occur, the focus is around skills building and the capacity building of the child to cope with the demands of his or her environment and to manage it, as opposed to psychotherapy. We do not provide psychotherapy in education. The focus of our service is to build skills and to inform teachers how to best support children who are presenting with anxiety or high levels of stress in school.