Children from the Traveller/Roma communities

If your child is a member of the Irish Traveller or Roma community, there is additional educational support and advice available on the education of your children.

Support available

Your child’s school will ask all parents to identify their child’s ethnicity as part of the enrolment procedure. If you identify your child as an Irish Traveller or Roma, the Department of Education (DE) allocates additional funding to the school to help them to support your child. The information you provide to the school will be kept confidential at all times.

Each education and library board (ELB) has staff members with an understanding of the Traveller/Roma communities community and who are dedicated to supporting both schools and parents. The Department of Education funds each ELB to provide these services, which vary according to local requirements.

Information about education for Traveller children, can be found on the Department of Education’s website.

Department of Education – Traveller children

A DVD about education called ‘Changing Times’ is also available for Traveller parents. Contact Karen Turner in the Southern Education and Library Board on (028) 37520727 for further information.

If you have identified your child as Roma, it may be that your child does not have satisfactory language skills to participate fully in the school curriculum and does not have a language in common with the teacher.

There are many other children in a similar situation enrolled in schools here. They are referred to as Newcomers. Support is available and you can find out more information on the Education Support for Northern Ireland and Department of Education websites.