Travellers moving into education mainstream

Biddy Kavanagh has been involved in education for more or less a quarter of a century - since her eldest son, now 29, started school. A member of the travelling community, Biddy is a part-time education worker with Tullamore Travellers' Group and has nine children, ranging from 29 right down to 12 years old. She has noticed a difference in her own children's education since her eldest's school-going days, compared to that of her youngest daughter who is now in fifth class. "I am more aware of my own children's education and I suppose I can go down and check with their teachers that they are getting the education they are entitled to. That wouldn't have happened with my 29-year-old."

There are now more resources for Travellers as well, she says: "I think if they were around when I had six or seven children going to school, it might have made more of a difference to me.

"There is a huge change in Travellers looking at education to see how important it is in that number of years."

The Kavanagh family is settled and they have been living in a house in an estate in Tullamore, Co Tipperary, for the last six years. Before that they lived at a local halting site.

They have undergone a number of moves, but didn't move as much as other families might have moved, says Biddy.

"In a lifetime they may have moved four schools, which wasn't too bad. They got on fairly well in school. In England they got on brilliant at school because they weren't seen as Travellers; they were seen to be Irish."

Her children have not escaped from prejudice at school. Biddy gives an example - how, in the schoolyard, the other children wouldn't allow them join in games: "If they joined in the others would walk off and leave them, that type of thing."

At one stage there were special classes set up, which a couple of her children went to. How that came about, says Biddy, is that "teachers saw travelling childer sitting in the back of a class not joining in with other kids".

Children from four to 14 were all taught together and these classes, which comprised completely of Traveller children, went on for 12 to 15 years.

Around 1994 Biddy came on board in the education section of the Tullamore Travellers' Movement and they lobbied for an end to the classes. Surveys showed that teachers and parents thought it wasn't a good idea and that children should be integrated into the main classes.

The classes were integrated and the class was done away with. The children themselves feel better as a result of the change: "Can you imagine a 14-year-old in with a four-year-old, what it can even do for their own self-esteem and confidence? It was vitally important."

Then came the complaint that the children weren't doing their homework: "We did a bit of research into it and we opened up a homework club. That's up and running now about four years and it's proven very good and positive." The project is fully integrated and is based in Tullamore Travellers' Movement. It caters for 18 children and parents are involved by coming in two days a week and doing two hours each day, helping them to do their homework.

"It has proven very, very positive, not alone for the childer, but for the parents that would be involved, volunteering. They would have learnt that they can also help their children to do their homework and create space."

An after-school project also exists for post-primary students, which is working very well.

All of Biddy's nine children have made the transition from primary to post-primary. Most of them have dropped out in second or third year and just one went on to do the Junior Cert.

So how does the future look? "Well hopefully it will get a bit better," says Biddy.

"Hopefully the ones gone into transition this year . . . hopefully, with the help of everyone, maybe they'll stay on to do their Leaving. That would sort of be a dream come true for me to see them, each and every one of them, doing a good Leaving Cert."