Ms Tracey Reilly:

Many of the parents who were doing home schooling were very early school leavers. There were challenges with very low literacy skills, no IT skills and nothing to support them. They were just handed out these booklets of information on homework that needed to be done and was very challenging, and to be honest, could not be done. I saw that on the ground and it was very challenging in halting sites, mobile homes and the back of houses, not having electricity, not having study space or having anyone to turn to for additional support. Letters or text might have been sent out to parents who could not read them. We could go on all day about the challenges and barriers but these existed long before Covid. That is clear in the report we did in 2020, and the one in 2021 is to follow. Looking at the form, it is basically repeating the same things. There were a lot of challenges.