As a young Traveller, I was lucky to have parents who strongly believed in school. I was able to get basic primary education. My parents had eight children and, as I am second-eldest, I look back and cannot understand how my mother, who had no access to water, toilets or electricity, in rain, sunshine or snow, made sure we got up and went to school.
My parents never went to school so they didn't know anything about many of the issues involved. For example, the policy in some to have separate Traveller classes and playground areas, and putting Traveller children to the back of the class and allowing them to kill time by drawing.
Common questions I hear are: "Why don't you Travellers go to school and get jobs like normal people?" The majority of Traveller children who go to school can't wait to finish primary so they can be free and get back to mixing with their own. They are made feel so uncomfortable by the racist attitudes of some teachers and peers and have to hide that they are Travellers to fit in and be "normal". When you experience that negative attitude at such a young age, you tend to avoid the unnecessary.
On a positive note, I have a nephew who is eight and his teacher let every child on a mock stage tell all about their homes and families. As a child from a home where being a Traveller is a positive thing and he is encouraged to be himself, he was the first up to tell about his "mobile home". For me that is a dramatic change.
On the other hand the experience of being different is too often punished. The old segregated classes are mostly gone. The new system is withdrawal, where Traveller children taken out of their class go to the resource teacher. I have another nephew who is top of his class. When he moved to a new school he was automatically withdrawn from class because he is a Traveller.
I don't see why this should happen. It's like saying that because you're a Traveller you must be stupid. I know from talking to other teachers that in other countries withdrawing a child from class is the last resort. If they need help the help is brought into the classroom. Why can't we do that here?
For me the way forward is for schools and other service-providers to recognise that the people using their services are from a lot of different backgrounds.
They need to take steps to deal with racism by developing antiracist policies for inclusion and involvement of Traveller children and children from minority ethnic backgrounds.