Sorca Clarke (Longford-Westmeath, Sinn Fein)
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41. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills when the counselling supports pilot scheme that was rolled out to a number of primary schools across seven counties will be reviewed, fully implemented and extended to the rest of the counties. [23806/24]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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In June 2023, I was very pleased to launch a €5 million pilot of counselling and wellbeing supports in primary schools in selected counties. My Department also secured additional funding in Budget 2024 to continue the pilot for an additional year, until June 2025. This further supports the range of mental health and wellbeing supports already provided by my Department and the excellent work already happening in schools in relation to wellbeing. All of which supplements the mental health supports which are offered by the HSE throughout the country.

Schools in pilot areas have warmly welcomed both strands of the pilot. Strand 1 sees direct counselling supports being provided to primary schools for the first time. NEPS psychologists are supporting schools to identify and prioritise children to access the counselling support, guided by the Continuum of Support, and subject to parental or legal guardian informed consent.

My Department has set up county panels of pre-approved private counsellors providing one-to-one counselling in primary schools in counties Cavan, Laois, Leitrim, Longford, Mayo, Monaghan, and Tipperary. The counsellors on the panel are currently providing counselling sessions to children in primary schools in the pilot counties.

In total, 778 blocks of counselling have been allocated to schools across the pilot counties, which provides an allocation to 778 children in these counties. To date, 35 counsellors have been recruited across the 7 pilot counties. Counsellors are available to work in all 7 counties of the pilot and my Department continue to accept applications from counsellors on an ongoing basis. The Department is actively recruiting counsellors to work on this pilot and I would encourage all counsellors who are accredited by the accrediting bodies included to make themselves available for this important work.

Strand 2 of the pilot is the establishment of a new type of support to schools from Education Wellbeing Teams and involves the introduction of Education Wellbeing Practitioners to provide enhanced in-school supports for a cluster of primary schools in Cork, Carlow, Dublin 7, and Dublin 16.

15 Education Wellbeing Practitioners have been recruited to the four cluster areas and have undergone an intensive training programme provided by NEPS. The Education Wellbeing Teams are working with pupils, parents, and school staff to support wellbeing and resilience at a whole school level. NEPS psychologists are providing oversight and professional supervision to support and maintain the work undertaken by the practitioners. This will ensure safe practice and the use of evidence-informed programmes and supports in schools.

As this is a pilot, it is not possible to include all schools. An external evaluation is being commissioned to review both strands of the pilot. Through this existing pilot programme and subsequent evaluation my Department is confident that it will gather valuable learning that will inform future policy and provision in this area.

Separately, to supplement support for the post-primary sector, I recently announced a tender to procure services to further support wellbeing and mental health in post-primary schools. The tender process is currently underway to seek suitable providers to work with the Department to enhance the support already being provided through Student Support Teams to support the wellbeing and mental health of young people in post primary schools.