On Thursday 26th May 2022 in Wynns Hotel Dublin, National Traveller MABS launched the Financial Guide to College: Information about the financial supports that are available if you are considering further education. The guide aims to help Travellers who are thinking about going to college or Travellers who are in college.
Speaking at the launch Fiona Coyne, CEO, Citizens Information Board said:
“This guide is another great example of how National Traveller MABS wants to break down barriers, particularly financial barriers, for Travellers accessing further education. This will lead to greater employment opportunities, earning potential and more choices in life.” She added: “In CIB’s policy submission to the Department of Further and Higher Education, last year, on the SUSI grant scheme we noted that the economic consequences of Covid 19 had led to difficulties particularly for disadvantaged students including Travellers. We recommended that the maintenance grant levels be increased to cover accommodation costs and cost of living increases. We were delighted to see that many of our recommendations on the SUSI grant scheme were taken on board.”
The guide came about as a direct result of the number of queries our National Education Worker was getting from members of the community about financial supports whether for themselves or for their children. The information was not easily available all in one place and this guide was seen as the answer to a lot of those queries. David Friel, Traveller Access Officer with ATU Sligo and Marie Clarke of Ballyfermot MABS kindly proofed the guide to make sure that the information was accurate and that it was written in an accessible and understandable way.
Part of the negative stereotyping of Travellers is the belief Travellers are not interested in education. This is not true and the majority of Traveller parents value education and see it as being important for their children’s future. This is also reflected in the number of Travellers who return to education as adults.
66% of Traveller adults have participated in at least one training scheme, with 2.4 the average number of training schemes attended. With only 1% of Travellers attending third level, though this figure is rising, it is important to encourage more Travellers to attend third level but also support their access and retention in third level and this guide aims to support that.
It is a universal guide for individuals, parents, schools and guidance counsellors that brings together all of the information needed in one easy to understand package.
We hope that the guide will be an important and useful tool for any Traveller thinking of going on to further education, for any Traveller parent trying to navigate the system with their child and ultimately for anyone at all that wants to know what's available to support them at third level.
We were honoured on the day to have an all Traveller panel speak about their experiences of third level and the barriers that they faced. We had 47 people attend the launch in person, while the live stream/recording was viewed 272 times. 500 copies of the guide were distributed to Traveller organisations, access offices in colleges, MABS and CIS offices and libraries following the launch.
