Sir, - Thank you for the opportunity to read Mary McDonnell's account of going through the educational system as a member of our travelling community (September 8th). Her story of having a "great dream to become a writer" and of her determination to not "leave school without some achievement" is awe-inspiring. Mary's courage; her school-friends' attitudes; and the active support of her second-level school, and especially that of two of the teachers, deserves more than our admiration. The best response to such wisdom is to ensure that achievements such as Mary's are not just the result of the happy conjunction of events and people but are built into the very fabric of our society.
For how can we be comfortable with the idea that, in 1999, Mary's story is so unusual and that for her to be in the same state of excitement and apprehension as thousands of other teenagers in our society, is due to her own exceptional courage and the chance meeting with such constructive teachers and with an ethos of inclusion and respect in her secondary school? What kind of society have we created that Mary's early years in primary school were experienced by her as a time when she was learning that she was "different" and that others (from a different community to her own) "knew best for me"?
When will we take seriously the right of all people to have access to the "goods" of our society? When will we challenge the attitude that identifies difference (cultural, ethnic, economic) as inferior, unworthy of respect, punishable and to be expelled? When will Mary be able to write that "being different" is recognised as bringing riches to any society in which she lives, that "being different" is a source of pride and inclusion which carries the right to speak and not be spoken for by "experts"?
I hope that Mary will continue to write and to speak out but it would indeed be wrong to place the burden of changing our society on Mary and her community. The task is one for all of us, members of both communities together. - Yours, etc.,
Bernadette O'Sullivan, Whitebeam Road, Clonskeagh, Dublin 14.