Ms Jill McCanney:

Yes, it is exactly the same model. When we look at individual referrals, whether it is the 60 young people in Northern Ireland or the 12 young people in the Republic of Ireland, it is the same model of intervention. For individual referrals, we work across both home and school. The difference with the whole-school model is we do not work with individual children. That would usually be an additional three to four whole schools seen in Northern Ireland although they are included in that referral number. In that context, we do not work with an individual child or young person but rather with a team in that school. We set up the team and really upskill it in developing its capacity to offer neurodiverse-affirmative practices in the school's approaches to teaching and learning. While we do not work in the home context within that model, we still provide parental training within that school so the school will invite parents in to attend workshops and training. The focus there is very much on building the capacity of the whole school and how it can develop its environments, approaches, strategies and teaching styles to best support the need of that whole autistic population within the school.