Epidemiological studies suggest that between 10 and 20 percent of children in the general population have severe enough symptoms to qualify them for some form of psychiatric diagnosis. Yet fewer than half will receive services to address their problems. There are also worrying signs that mental health among young people may be deteriorating in some countries, particularly the UK.

On another, similar front, long-term studies make it clear that children need strong cognitive and non-cognitive foundations upon which to build later competencies and that there is a criss-crossing between the kind of skills they learn and outcome ‘domains.'

Nobel prize winning economist James Heckman, for example, has demonstrated that non-cognitive skills are important predictors of later socio-economic success, similarly that strong cognitive foundations early in development predict later educational as well as social-emotional well-being. All the components are vital and interwoven.

The consensus is that we need