Ms Anne Tansey:

We will be available for consultation. We may not be there on the ground but we are always available for consultation with our schools and we will continue to be available to support school staff to build their capacity to manage the situation. Our expectation around the well-being of children as they return to school is that some will be very happy, relived and excited to be back. There will be other children who experience some degree of anxiety but we anticipate that most will settle down quite quickly after an initial period. It is normal to expect some anxiety but most children will settle down. That is our expectation. We are also planning for and supporting teachers to notice those children who are struggling or are reluctant to come to school. There may be students who arrive with behaviour presentations that are different from normal and who fail to settle down. We will be working with teachers and school staff to notice and plan for how we might respond in order to support children if that happens.