The first meeting of the planning group to produce proposals for a National Educational Psychological Service will take place in the Department of Education today.
The teachers' unions, parents and school management bodies and the Psychological Society of Ireland will be represented on the group, as will the Departments of Education, Health and Finance.
The group will make recommendations on "the management and organisational arrangements necessary for delivery of an effective national educational psychological service". It will look particularly at children with special needs and those who drop out of school at late primary or early second-level stage.