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Irish Times
13-07-2025
- Politics
- Irish Times
Tramore community rally around Albanian family facing deportation
Dozens of parents and children gathered under the hot July sunshine on Saturday morning in the seaside town of Tramore calling on the Minister for Justice not to deport an Albanian family and to grant them permission to remain on humanitarian grounds . Students from Tramore Educate Together national school, including classmates of Luna, the six-year-old daughter of the family, took part in the rally outside Ocean View Guest House, where the family has lived since they moved to Co Waterford in 2022. The family has been told they must return to Albania by the end of August or they will be removed from the State. Participants in Saturday's rally chanted 'deportation no way, we want our friends to stay' and held up posters with messages including 'trá mór, grá mór' and 'our friends belong here'. 'The fact that we're rallying support around a six-year-old is horrendous,' said parent and organiser Aoife O'Driscoll. 'Our kids are sitting around making posters to stop her being taken away. It's lovely but it's awful.' READ MORE Ms O'Driscoll launched a campaign for the family last week after discovering her child's classmate had received a deportation notice. Nearly all the parents in the 180-pupil school have since offered their support for the family, says Ms O'Driscoll. 'Luna's entire life is in Tramore, her friends are in Tramore. We saw her running out of school recently with Réalt na Seachtaine for the best Irish that week. She doesn't know any of this is happening.' Luna's mother, who requested not to be named, says the family was 'forced to leave' Albania in 2022 because of threats to their safety. They were particularly concerned for their daughter due to the risk of child trafficking, she said. 'We heard Ireland was safe and it was very far from Albania. I was sure that person looking for us would not find our family here,' she said. 'No one wants to talk badly about their country of origin but Albania is not safe.' Albania is one of 15 jurisdictions designated as safe countries of origin by the State for the purposes of international protection applications. The family spent a few months in the Balseskin accommodation centre in Finglas, Dublin, before being transferred to Tramore in late 2022. Parents and students from Tramore Educate Together National School on calling on Saturday for an Albanian family not to be deported. Photograph: Aoife O'Driscoll They were refused permission to remain and were notified in April they had to leave Ireland by May 17th, 2025. They secured an extension until the end of August because Luna's younger brother, who was born in Ireland with complex medical needs and underwent surgery earlier this year, had a hospital appointment in July. The mother, who worked as an English-language teacher in Albania, works as a cleaner and her husband is in construction. The suspense of not knowing what will happen to her children 'is killing me', she says. 'I'm trying to be strong but there are days I feel I cannot breathe, you feel your time is ending. Sometimes I just want to give up but I have to go on for my children. It's not their fault that we had problems and were forced to leave Albania.' The Tramore Educate Together parents association contacted the Department of Justice on July 1st, saying its decision to deport the family 'knowingly put a child's life at risk'. The two-year-old 'requires complex care that will simply not be available to him should this family be deported', read the letter. The family have 'built a life' in Tramore and deporting them will 'inflict irreparable trauma on each of them', it said. An petition , signed by more than 500 people, calls on the Government to treat the family's situation with 'the nuanced, discerning approach that is required when human lives are at stake'. A Department of Justice spokesman said officials 'aim to process families in a holistic manner' but 'a child's immigration case is highly dependent on the status of their parents'. He added: 'Each child's circumstances are examined in detail before a deportation order is made and voluntary return is offered.' If families do not engage with gardaí and leave the State within a prescribed time frame, 'they can be arrested and detained in order to make the arrangements for their deportation,' he said, adding that 'children are never detained'. Enforced removals of children are only carried out 'as a measure of last resort when the family concerned has not removed themselves from the State as they are legally required to'. Some 106 people have been deported from Ireland on chartered flights so far this year, while 69 were removed on commercial airlines and another 30 people left unescorted. These included 106 Georgians, 36 Nigerians, 18 Brazilians, seven Algerians and five Albanians, according to Government data. Thirteen of those deported so far this year were children. Last week, Minister for Justice Jim O'Callaghan said he had no plans to cease the deportation of children. 'Any such policy would make Ireland an outlier in Europe and could encourage more people to come here with children, knowing that they could not be removed regardless of the outcome of their case,' he told the Dáil.
Irish Times
16-05-2025
- Health
- Irish Times
Smartphones for children ‘not a human right', public meeting on a ban in primary schools is told
Parents have been asked to sign up to a pledge to keep smartphones away from their children until they have, at least, finished primary school. Some 250 parents from 13 primary schools in North Dublin attended a meeting at the Dublin 7 Educate Together National School where it was suggested that peer pressure to own a phone would be a lot less if parents agreed collectively to a ban. The initiative has already taken place in Greystones, Co Wicklow and in Killarney, Co Kerry where schools have combined to adopt a smartphone-free childhood policy within local schools in the towns. The draft pledge proposed to schools in the Dublin 7 and Dublin 15 areas commits a smartphone-free children for the duration of primary school with the caveat: 'I/we understand that basic phones [call/text only] may be necessary for some families, but smartphones with internet access and apps will be delayed until, at least, secondary school.' READ MORE Pelletstown Educate Together National School principal Caitríona Ní Cheallaigh said a survey among parents locally showed overwhelming support for a ban on smartphones for younger children though parents are divided by the time children get to sixth class. She suggested that it is not enough for parents in one school to ban smartphones, it has to be a community-wide given the interactions between children from different schools. 'We are hoping that this community initiative will enable parents to know that their child will not be the only one who does not have a phone.' Children and Adult Mental Health Services senior clinical psychologist Dr Eleanor Griffith said she has never heard of a parent who was glad to have given their child a mobile phone. 'Generally, they say it is because of peer pressure because their child isn't left out,' she explained. 'We see a big impact on sleep and that has a knock-on effect on their mental health. Young children are struggling to sleep because they are on devices all the time.' Psychotherapist Dr Colman Noctor said having a smartphone is not a 'human right'. You have to earn the right by showing responsibility and children have to be given the time to be responsible with smartphone, he explained, and self-regulation of smartphone use for children is 'next to near impossible' when adults are also struggling. 'Bans are not the answer, but they might buy time for children and young teenagers to be ready for it rather than giving them to them when they are socially and emotionally incapable of navigating things like that.' He said that while issues around cyberbullying, access to pornography and grooming often get the most attention around smartphones and children, the effects can be more insidious and widespread. Time spent on smartphones is time that previous generations of children spent with their peers, reading or playing sport outside. 'Teenagers can feel very lonely, empty and a bit directionless because they spend so much time in a place that is so soulless,' he said. 'A lot of the big issues around young people and low life satisfaction are because of constant comparisons and the tyranny of choice.' Parent Fergus McCardle, who has three and six-year-old children, said he is in favour of 'building a collective' around smartphone use. If only one child in a class has access to snapchat, they don't have an outlet to use it if there is a general ban. Claire McInerney, who has two daughters (9 and 14) said she agreed with a smartphone ban until sixth class but there is a 'jump from primary to secondary school and it is a good idea to get them used to having a phone before the end of sixth class so they don't have to navigate all of that while also starting in a secondary school.'
Irish Examiner
07-05-2025
- Politics
- Irish Examiner
Minister instructs school patrons to review enrolment policies for special classes
School patrons have been directed to review their enrolment policies for special classes following a review that highlighted 'concerning' clauses and criteria that could limit autistic students' access to education. Minister for education Helen McEntee has instructed the school patrons, who are responsible for enrolment policies, to initiate the review after the Department of Education's Inspectorate published its findings. Carried out between last September and December, the review looked at the admission policies of 30 schools, including 15 post primary schools, and 15 primary schools. The review identified issues in 14 out of 15 post primary schools, and 12 out of the 15 primary policies, "raising significant concerns", said chief inspector Yvonne Keating. Some admissions policies required children to be able to participate in mainstream lessons as a condition for admission, while other clauses 'reserved the right to withdraw the offer of a place based on a perception of the student's behaviour.' The review of policies also indicated that many schools use the possibility of a child displaying behaviours that may pose a risk to the health and safety of others as a basis for exclusion from a special class. The report noted that "clauses that use perceived behaviour as a criterion for admission to a special class may imply that children with the greatest level of need cannot be supported to regulate their behaviour". "In addition, it is not possible to predict how children will respond to the structure of the school, the special class environment and to the school's support and provision." The inspectorate also noted that the way in which some schools interpret their responsibilities under the Education Act 1998 is 'leading them to discriminate against those children with the greatest level of need'. 'This approach, which unduly qualifies the right of some children to an inclusive education, does not acknowledge the impact and influence of interconnected environmental systems on their development.' 'It does not recognise how the culture and systems in place in a school can positively impact on children and their experience of and interaction with school.' This qualified approach to inclusion may also not align with Ireland's commitments to inclusive education under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), it added. Multi-denominational schools Meanwhile, school patron body Educate Together has called on Government to act on increasing the number of multi-denominational schools to improve choice for parents. Educate Together is the largest multi-denominational school patron in Ireland, having opened 50 schools since 2013. However, as no new schools are planned to open, it is calling for action on the schools reconfiguration for diversity initiative. Representatives from Educate Together met with TDs at Leinster House on Wednesday. Demand for Educate Together schools continues to grow, but 90% of primary schools remain under Catholic patronage, said Emer Nowlan, chief executive. "The successful transition of the first Catholic school to Educate Together opens up a pathway for others to follow, and there is broad support now for reconfiguration. We are calling on the new Government to proceed with the promised national survey of parents, and to support school communities that decide to transfer, so that more families can access this popular option." Read More Multi-denominational secondary school enrolments exceed Catholic counterparts
Irish Examiner
25-04-2025
- Entertainment
- Irish Examiner
Beginner's pluck: Teacher and newspaper columnist Jennifer Horgan
A shy, sensitive child who worried what other people thought, Jennifer started writing poetry aged 10 or 11. 'I was interested in death — my mum's parents had died when she was 12, and I wrote dark, dramatic poems,' she says. 'I didn't read much until I was a teenager.' Considering journalism as a career, Jennifer started writing freelance for the Evening Echo in her early 20s: 'But someone said I wasn't tough enough for journalism, and I thought, I have an English degree, so I can teach.' After training, she moved to London and worked in an all-boys' Catholic comprehensive school in East London. 'It was a deep culture shock,' she says. 'At first, I felt at sea and cried every day. I got lost on the tube, but after a year I loved it.' Care, by Jennifer Horgan. After six years, married with two children, Jennifer moved to Abu Dhabi, working in an international school: 'We had a third baby and came home in 2018. I now teach three days a week in an Educate Together Secondary school.' Also, Jennifer does some freelance journalism: 'I wrote 'Secret Teacher' for the Irish Examiner for some years, and in 2021 wrote a non-fiction book, O Captain, My Captain, on the education system. I now write features for The Echo and a column for the Irish Examiner.' Who is Jennifer Horgan? Date of birth: 1980 in Cork. Education: Scoil Mhuire; University College Cork, English and philosophy; MA in English; H Dip. Home: Cork. Family: Husband Ciaran, children Sam, 14, Anna, 12, and May, 10. The day job: Secondary school teacher, 'and creative projects with the city council'. In another life: 'I'd love a nomadic life; travelling, journaling everything.' Favourite writers: Seamus Heaney; Donal Ryan; Annie Ernaux; Doireann Ní Ghríofa; Nuala O'Faolain; Joan Didion. Second book: 'I'm writing a second collection.' Top tip: Write. 'It's the only way to improve.' Instagram: @ The debut: Care. Doire Press: €16. These arresting, sometimes stark poems concentrate on the vulnerability of people; of kindnesses and slights; of motherhood and daughterhood — and of the challenges caused by the pandemic. The verdict An original and perceptive examination of the frailty of living. Jennifer Horgan will make an appearance at The West Cork Literary Festival on July 11 (
