Oireachtas Joint and Select Committees

Wednesday, 20 October 2021

Joint Committee On Health

Impact of Covid-19 on Children: Discussion

Mr. John Church:

What we are trying to do is to get into schools and clubs earlier. If we look at mini-rugby or mini-GAA, it is about having a presence there. We use some of the ambassadors and we will be using them a lot more, so there would be those like Kellie Harrington, if we can get our hands on her, and we would have them on social media, giving messages to children that it is okay to talk. One of the programmes we introduced during Covid, thankfully, is one that addresses the transition from primary school to secondary school, which we know, from talking to children and from Childline data, is a particularly traumatic time. It runs from ages 11 to 12, 12 or 13 and 13 to 14. We have introduced a programme called Smart Moves and 50 schools have taken us up on that. The Minister for Education is very keen on that so once we have done an academic term on that, we would be hopeful of engaging with all schools at that level. We have identified in our strategic review that the 11 to 13 age range is a key intervention time to build resilience for children.

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