Mr. Feargal Brougham:

As a school principal, an educator and especially as a trade unionist, I consistently strive, as does the teaching profession, and work at trying to make schools as inclusive as possible. Of course we do not always succeed because these are complex issues. Educators must not be hypocritical and must be open to listening to advice from wider society and communities. We must listen and learn because that is the nature of our profession. There is nothing a teacher wants more than to make the experience of education as beneficial and positive as possible for the members and pupils they teach.

Deputy Funchion asked about some of the practical issues to take from listening to everyone today. When we consider the restoration from the level of cuts, one of the key things we are talking about is trying to respond to and understand a community. The visiting teacher worked at different levels as a bridge between schools and the wider Traveller community. It was about the chance to break down some of those barriers. When that was taken out of the system, it had an effect on those schools with some of the issues we are talking about now. This is especially relevant if parents had a bad experience at school, because the visiting teacher was able to relay that directly to the school whereas the home school liaison teacher has not had years of experience doing that. The role was simply cut overnight and that had a dramatic effect.

The idea of the National Council for Curriculum and Assessment is wonderful. I am involved with the Irish National Teachers Organisation in a project called global citizenship school. We are trying to promote all social justice and human rights issues in programmes. We are trying to embed these in the curriculum. I am 100% supportive of the Yellow Flags project because it is a great idea.

I was reflecting on an idea before I came to the meeting today. It dawned on me as a teacher of 30 years that I do not think I ever taught a lesson on the Traveller community.

It is really only when a teacher is hit with that and then a person comes from the community that the teacher will question himself. That is quite stunning. I must have taught thousands of lessons over the years on all kinds of issues and all types of countries and yet the topic was never in a book that I either chose to or had to deliver to a class.

Reference was made to grants following the children. The school I work for in Ayrfield is not part of the Delivering Equality of Opportunities in Schools, DEIS, programme. One particular cut was implemented and there has been little talk of it being restored. As a non-DEIS school, we used to get a grant to help supplement children who we believed were in need. That is something to be looked at when we are looking at the 50% of schools that are non-DEIS. Reference has been made to how the capitation grant only covers 80% of the heating and insurance costs in a school. Restoration of a particular grant earmarked to help children who need greater access to the curriculum is worth considering.

Reference was made to how we were not exactly in nirvana in 2011. It is certainly better now although child poverty rates have risen 11% since those cuts. I am unsure whether that is a direct result.

A suggestion was made about some element of the visiting teacher for Travellers service. It is important regardless of whether we increase the number of home school liaison teachers or by providing other ways of getting out and bringing the community into the school or bringing the school out to the community and bridging those gaps.