Homeless family’s 260km round trip to school every day
A HOMELESS Dublin family forced into emergency accommodation in Kilkenny brought their children on a 260km daily round trip back to school.
When they arrived late, they apologised, said principal Gregor Kerr.
The story is an example of the shocking toll that the growing homelessness crisis is wreaking on families and young children.
Mr Kerr, who is principal of a school in Dublin’s north inner city, said a significant proportion of his pupils were homeless, or affected by homelessness.
He said there was an immediate impact on children in terms of not being able to invite friends around or having space for homework, as well as longterm damage being inflicted.
“If they are homeless for a considerable period of time, it takes a big chunk out of their development. In that way it becomes an education issue.”
He said because his school was in the Department of Education’s DEIS scheme for disadvantaged communities, it offered supports such as breakfast, but he said not all schools had additional resources to do that.
About 3,755 children are homeless across Ireland and recent figures show that 500 became homeless in February.
Irish National Teachers’ Organisation general secretary Sheila Nunan said that translated into 35 pupils becoming homeless every two days.
Ms Nunan took Education Minister Richard Bruton to task over the crisis and the impact homelessness was having on children’s education.
“Schoolchildren who are homeless are seriously struggling in school, while their teachers struggle to help them cope,” she said
She strongly criticised the lack of response from the Department of Education and Skills and called for additional resources for schools, as well as advice and guidance.
“Teachers are waiting for the department to recognise that homelessness is an educational crisis too,” she said.
Teachers’ Union of Ireland general secretary John MacGabhann said at his conference that teachers were seeing the effects of homelessness on children every day in the classroom.
“Many have had scant, if any, experience of that most basic facility – a home. They are consigned instead to a twilight zone where making and keeping friends is difficult and having privacy and stability impossible.”
He accused the Government of “mulish obstinacy” on the issue and called for “major public investment” in housing, both social and affordable, saying the problem can be remedied if the Government changes course.