School Avoidance - Education Alternatives
School Attendance in Ireland and the alternatives for early school leavers and children refusing to attend school.
(thanks to Parentline volunteer Eilish Cattanach for compilation the information for this article)
In Ireland, the law states that children must attend education between the age of 6 and 16, or until students have completed 3 years of second-level education, whichever is the later. Tusla (the child and family agency) has a responsibility to ensure that children attend school regularly, or otherwise receives an appropriate minimum education. Tusla's emphasis is on helping schools, families and children, rather than imposing penalties for non-attendance at school. Tusla employs educational welfare officers at local level throughout the country to provide support and advice to parents and schools and to follow up on absences from school.
Parentline calls 2025
2025 was another record year for Parentline with a massive 9% increase in calls recorded for the year. Parentline took 7,020 calls in 2025 as compared to 6,461 in 2024. The principal stand out statistics were:
- 29.9% of calls from male callers in 2025
- Anger/aggression remains the standout issue accounting for two out of five of all calls. There were 3000 calls on this issue in 2025. This is an increase from 35% in 2024
- Calls on anxiety rise to 15% of all calls with over 1000 parents calling in relation to this concern.
- Calls on school avoidance increase to 9% of calls
- Social media concerns double to 3.5% of all calls in 2025
2025 was a record year for Parentline with the charity taking over 7,000 calls for the first time since it was established 44 years ago.
Parentline is the national helpline for parents offering support, information and guidance to parents on any and all issues in relation to parenting. In 2025 the Parentline volunteers took or made 7,020 calls. This was an increase of 9% on 2024 when the charity had 6,461 calls, demonstrating the growing demand for parental support services across Ireland.
Calls on the issue of social media and the associated dangers for children accessing these platforms emerged as an increasing concern for parents calling Parentline in 2025. Twice as many parents rang the helplines in relation to worries over social media use than in 2024 with 3.5% of calls being in relation to this area as opposed to 1.8% in 2024. This was ten times more than calls on the issue in 2023.
“More parents than ever are concerned about the negative impact on their children’s mental health caused by social media use. Parents worry about cyberbullying, exposure to harmful or inappropriate content, oversharing, online grooming, anxiety and excessive screen time”, said Parentline CEO Aileen Hickie.
“We have trusted social media platforms to mind the online safety of our children and it has not worked. Self-regulation is simply not happening or not good enough. It is like asking the fox to mind the hen house. They have remained largely unregulated and unaccountable. Now is the time to enforce mandatory regulation of these digital platforms. They have to be forced to take some level of responsibility towards children’s rights and what protections should be afforded to prevent them accessing materials that are unsafe or harmful,” added Hickie. “A ban for under 16 year olds on using social media services similar to the one recently introduced in Australia, could help to prevent children from being harmed. It certainly needs to be explored in an effort to protect children from harmful online content and algorithms. More needs to be done to keep our children safe online. We can’t continue to allow children to have unregulated access to social media platforms.” “But essentially parents are the biggest influence in a child’s life. It is crucial for parents to teach their children about online safety, including privacy, cyberbullying and stranger danger. If a child has access to the internet, then the internet also has access to them.”
Fathers Calling Parentline
Almost one third of all calls to Parentline now comes from a dad
When Parentline was first set up almost 100% of the calls came from mothers. In the first year of operation Parentline received one call from a father. In the intervening years the number of fathers calling the helpline is increasing all the time. Calls from fathers now represent approx. 32.5% of calls.
The content of calls from fathers has also changed. 20 years ago fathers used to ask ‘how they could support their wife with her parenting.’ The calls from fathers now show they are playing a much more active role in parenting and there is no difference between the parenting issues raised by men and women.
Dr Lee Devaney, Psychologist specialising in Men’s Psychology talks on the importance of men reflecting and talking about their issues
Dr Lee Devaney underlines that parenting as a dad is different to parenting as a mother
Dr Lee Devaney stresses the importance of ringing Parentline as a first step, for any dads who are having difficulties in being a parent
Anxiety
All adults and children feel anxious and worried at times. Anxiety is a normal and natural occurrence. It’s part of life.
It can’t be allowed to become overwhelming or defining. Children can experience anxiety about different issues at different stages of their lives. For the most part, this is just one more element of growing up.
Sleep Matters
The importance of sleep for Parents and Children
Sleep is crucial for children's growth, brain development, and emotional regulation. Quality sleep significantly impacts cognitive development, emotional well-being, and physical growth. Furthermore, children's sleep directly influences parents' mental health, stress levels, and productivity. Improved sleep in children leads to better mental health for parents.
The below two guides are free (courtesy of CulaBaby) so please just click on the links:
Parentline has given support, information and guidance to over 150,000 over the past 40 years
Parentline News
"Social media use 'an increasing concern' for parents, says helpline" - irishexaminer.com
Social media use has driven a surge in calls to the national parent support helpline and is "an increasing concern" for parents.
Calls to Parentline about social media use more than doubled last year, up from 1.8% in 2024 to 3.5% of calls. Chief executive Aileen Hickie said it is “an increasing concern” for parents.
“More parents than ever are concerned about the negative impact on their children’s mental health caused by social media use,” said Ms Hickie.
“Parents worry about cyberbullying, exposure to harmful or inappropriate content, oversharing, online grooming, anxiety and excessive screen time.”
She said the State needs to enforce the Online Safety and Media Regulation Act 2022, which gives the online safety regulator Coimisiún na Meán the power to impose fines up to €20m against social media platforms.
“Social media platforms have to be forced to take some responsibility for putting in place proper protections to prevent children accessing harmful material," said Ms Hickie.
There is no typical call
Parents call with all sorts of problems and children of all ages offer different parenting challenges. Anxiety, anger, aggression, isolation and loneliness, bullying, discipline, frustration, school avoidance, drugs, teenage issues and verbal and emotional abuse are just some of the main reasons for the calls we receive daily. What all our callers have in common is that they are seeking help, support and guidance. The vast majority of our callers are overwhelmingly satisfied with the service offered and the assistance received.
COMMON AREAS
Postnatal Depression
Parentline is the only national helpline, that offers support to new mothers suffering with the baby blues or postnatal depression, in confidence and over the phone. This means that a new mother does not have to get organised to leave the comfort of her own home if she needs support. Very often a depressed mother finds it very difficult to get dressed not to mind to leave her own house. Parentline offers a support service in her own home.
COMMON AREAS
Non Violent Resistance (NVR)
Non Violent Resistance is an evidence-based, non-blaming and relatively short-term intervention model that empowers parents and people working with them to take positive action to end the abusive and/or violent behaviour of a child.
In association with What Works.
SCHOOL TRANSITIONS
School life and the difficulties encountered by students (and parents) at the various stages of their educational journey.
7,000+
Calls per year
From people experiencing difficulties
43 years
Years Helping People
44 years of being there for parents (this year)
1
Objective
To give you the best possible support for your situation.