Helen McEntee (Meath East, Fine Gael)
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I would like to thank Deputy Clarke for her question regarding provision of mental health services to schools. It is important to note at the outset that responsibility for mental health services rests with the HSE. However, I can advise the deputy of the following services and initiatives are available to schools from my department.

The National Educational Psychological Service

My Department’s National Educational Psychological Service (NEPS) provides educational psychological support to all primary, post-primary, and special schools.

The NEPS service provides access for all schools to:

• psychological support in the event of a Critical Incident,
• a casework service for individual children where there is a need for intensive consultation and assessment via a NEPS psychologist or through the Scheme for the Commissioning of Psychological Assessments (SCPA),
• the School Staff Support and Development Service, to build school capability to provide a comprehensive continuum of support in schools,
• ongoing access to advice and support for schools, and
• an advisory service to schools where a psychologist is not available due to a vacancy.

Neart

Neart – the Irish word for strength, is the new national programme of mental health and well-being resources and training for post-primary schools. These comprehensive supports have been developed by Jigsaw in partnership with NEPS and with the Department of Education and Youth. The programme will complement the supports already available in schools such as the provision of guidance counselling and the work of NEPS, as well as other existing well-being programmes and initiatives including Student Support Team training. The Neart webpage provides all the relevant information schools require about the programme of supports and what’s on offer throughout 2025.

Counselling in Primary Schools Pilot

The Counselling in Primary Schools Pilot has two strands and works to support children’s well-being and mental health in schools. 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 providing one-to-one counselling in primary schools in counties Cavan, Laois, Leitrim, Longford, Mayo, Monaghan and Tipperary. To date, 43 counsellors have been recruited across the seven pilot counties. In total, 1,883 blocks of counselling have been allocated to schools across the pilot counties, which provides an allocation to 1,883 children in these counties. In the 2023/2024 school year 382 children availed of counselling under the pilot. To date, in the 2024/2025 school year, at least 421 children have availed of counselling.

In October 2024, my department announced the extension of Strand 1 of the Counselling in Primary Schools Pilot to sixty-one urban DEIS primary schools in Tallaght, Clondalkin, Finglas, Ballymun and Darndale. The schools that will now be included in the pilot have been identified by the Department of Education as supporting children from areas with some of the highest levels of disadvantage in the State. There are currently 4 counsellors on the panel for these areas and NEPS are continuing to accept and process applications on a rolling basis.

Strand 2 is the introduction of Education Well-being Teams to provide enhanced in-school supports for a cluster of primary schools in Cork, Carlow, Dublin 7 and Dublin 16. The Education Well-being Practitioner is a new type of practitioner being introduced as part of this pilot to provide enhanced in-school support. The practitioners are graduates from psychology, education and social science and have undergone an in-depth training programme provided by NEPS. The focus of the support to be provided under Strand 2 is on strengthening whole school preventative approaches. This includes the provision of psycho-educational support for parents and teachers, and the provision of early intervention to children with mild/emerging need, using low-level therapeutically informed approaches. To date, twenty Education Well-being Practitioners have been recruited to the four cluster areas. The supports being offered are to pupils, parents, and school staff to support the well-being and resilience of the school community.

The pilot is being externally evaluated by the Centre for Effective Services, who were the successful bidder following a competitive tendering process. Through this evaluation we are confident that we will gather valuable learning that will inform future policy and provision in this area.