A national education project to combat prejudice against people who are excluded from society was announced yesterday by the Minister for Justice, Mr O'Donoghue.
The project is being run by the Trust organisation, which provides health and social services for homeless people, and is sponsored by The Irish Times and the Department of Justice, with the support of the Rotary Club, Dublin.
Aimed at transition-year students, the project includes an essay competition based on material in a video, in a manual and on a website.
"We work with people every day who are excluded, who are outsiders," Ms Alice Leahy, director of Trust, said yesterday. "This is an attempt to share our experience with young people - who will run tomorrow's world - at a very formative stage in their lives, when for a brief time, in transition year, they get some time to take stock before the exam pressure intensifies and the points race takes over."
The project arose out of the response to A Fragile City, a programme about the work of Trust, made by the award-winning Esperanza Productions and broadcast on RTE late last year.
"The response we received to A Fragile City showed people we all share a certain `sameness' or vulnerability," Ms Leahy said.
Mr O'Donoghue said yesterday: "In our current prosperous times, people who are homeless can also be victims of discrimination and prejudice. The Trust initiative is a national education project designed to create awareness and to combat discrimination against such people."
He presented a cheque for £25,000 to Ms Leahy towards the cost of the project.
The website www.trust-ireland.ie features the stories of some of the people helped by Trust. Transition-year students can send entries directly from the website or through the post. The material for the competition will be sent to all second-level schools in October.
"We will accept any number of words, from a sentence to a few paragraphs up to a maximum of 500 words," Ms Leahy said. "What we are interested in are some thought-provoking ideas and comments."
The panel of adjudicators for the competition is chaired by the poet Michael O Siadhail. The broadcaster Pat Kenny officiated at yesterday's event.
Trust is chaired by Prof James McCormick. It was established in 1975 and is located at Bride Road, Dublin 8.
e-mail: info@trust-ireland.ie Trust website: www.trust-ireland.ie