Cathal Crowe (Clare, Fianna Fail)
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169. To ask the Minister for Education and Skills the cost of expanding the present mental health counselling pilots to include 1,000 additional pupils. [38588/24]

Norma Foley (Kerry, Fianna Fail)
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My Department is committed to supporting the mental health and wellbeing of all children. In June 2023 I launched a €5 million pilot of counselling and wellbeing supports in primary schools in selected counties. This Counselling in Primary Schools Pilot is in addition to the range of mental health and wellbeing supports already being provided by my Department and the excellent work already happening in schools in relation to wellbeing promotion. These supports include Cineáltas, the Departments’ Action Plan on Bullying, support from Oide (the teacher professional learning service) and support for schools from the National Educational Psychological Service (NEPS). These services and supports supplement the wellbeing and mental health supports and services provided by the HSE throughout the country for primary school aged children.

The Counselling in Primary Schools Pilot has two strands. Strand 1 sees direct counselling supports being provided to primary schools for the first time. My Department has set up county panels of pre-approved private counsellors to provide one-to-one counselling in primary schools in counties Cavan, Laois, Leitrim, Longford, Mayo, Monaghan and Tipperary.

Participating schools have been allocated blocks of up to six counselling sessions (per child) for a small number of children in the school. The sessions are book-ended by a pre and post session meeting with parents/legal guardians and relevant school staff. Parents and school staff are seen as key agents of change in a child’s life and are part of the intervention with the child and will be guided and encouraged to support the child at home and at school on an ongoing basis. The cost of a block of counselling, which is 8 sessions in total per individual child is €640. The cost of extending Strand 1 of the counselling pilot to an additional 1,000 pupils would be €640,000.

Last week, my Department issued the new allocations to schools for the 2024/2025 school year. For this school year, 1,015 blocks of counselling have been allocated to schools across the pilot counties, which will provide a block of counselling to 1,015 children in these counties.

Strand 2 of the Counselling in Primary Schools Pilot sees the establishment of Education Wellbeing Teams to support schools in cluster areas in Cork, Carlow, Dublin 7 and Dublin 16. Twenty Education Wellbeing Practitioners are working under the direction and supervision of lead NEPS psychologists. The Wellbeing Team is an innovative approach to provide enhanced in-school support. The Wellbeing Practitioners support the schools to strengthen their whole school preventative approach to promoting wellbeing and mental health, in line with the Department Wellbeing Policy. They provide psycho-educational support for parents, school staff and pupils and preventative evidence-based interventions to prevent mild and emerging social and emotional difficulties.

A dedicated webpage with information for parents, information for counsellors and information for schools is also available on www.gov.ie/en/publication/61be8-counselling-in-primary-schools-pilot-cps-p-2023-2025/.

It is not possible to include all children and all schools in the pilot. Through this existing pilot and subsequent evaluation we are confident that we will gather valuable learning that will inform future policy and provision in this area.