Rachel's T.S.C. Research Report preview page one

The Educational Needs of New Traveller Children"
Findings of the Travellers' School Charity Research Project
Funded by YAPP Charitable Foundation. Researched and written by Rachel Auckland

Covers:Educational need among New Traveller children, background and context, the people, family structures, the children, sites - camps, co-ops, sustainability initiatives - homes, the "scene", occupations, school or otherwise, patterns of schooling, reasons for home educating, site stability and school attendance, issues in current provision, New Travellers abroad, ideological and practical issues, affirming features
Published June 2000. 35 pages. Price £5.00 to individuals, £7.50 to institutions. Cheques payable to Travellers School Charity

T.S.C. Research Report Preview.

First of all I'd like to thank everyone	These ranged in size from one to one
who has helped with the research, including	hundred people. It is likely that this
research assistants Kaye (who checked	represents only a small fragment of the
out Ireland) Jane, Francis, and Lynette;	whole picture. Some of these sites may
and especially all those Travellers who	be no longer in use. I was only able to
agreed to be interviewed.	visit 18 of them, in South Wales,
	Cornwall, Devon, Somerset, Hampshire,
The people I spoke to identified	Wiltshire, and Dorset.
approximately 100 sites throughout
England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland,	The sites I visited displayed a wide variety
(discounting protest sites, which Travellers	of characteristics:
often frequent).

1. a one-woman chushty park up on a low-impact residential development; no kids.
2. a number of young families resorting to the yard of a rural, intentional community;
3. a well established, remote site accommodating several families varying from highly mobile to
semi-itinerant; kids from babes to teens, some home/non schooled.
4. a site comprising mainly male farm workers;
5. a site with good amenities seeking planning permission; frequented by kids of resident single parents.
6. a largish, tolerated "orbital" site; half a dozen school age kids, intermittently schooled
7. a large orbital site immediately post eviction; reports of children moved to other sites
8. a large roadside site preparing for eviction; lots of kids, up to 12, mostly out of school
9. a small encampment on common land; a few kids of infant school age, not attending.
10. a rural. squatted building with an organised group of several living vehicles; active EO
11. a well established, tolerated green lane site with a few caravans; one child visits
12. a small, crowded, insecure roadside site; under 5 plus baby.
13. a tolerated green lane site with one single parent and a couple of other households;
14. a medium sized licensed site with good amenities; several children in school OK
15. a small lay by (which has since been blocked);
16. a woodland skills course site; lots of kids, babes to teens, range of educational stories
17. a small extended family in a truck and bender on their own land without planning
18. and a number of individual vehicles in back streets in the city; a lad, an elder, a mum

I also attended Glastonbury festival and	Of the 22 vehicle and tent dwellers, one
Tewkesbury Medieval Fayre and spoke to	woman and one man described
a number of people there; and I	themselves as Showmen; four people said
interviewed a few people by phone.	they were not Travellers (because of no
	longer being mobile, or because of
I conducted a total of 43 interviews, of	wishing to distance themselves from the
which 14 are on tape. A few of the 43	poor image / stereotype of New
were happy to be identified and will	Travellers). Five did not specify an
provide "case studies" for the forthcoming	identity or preferred not to take a "label".
report but the majority prefer to remain
anonymous.	Also I chatted with innumerable others
	informally, and this has helped to build up
Of these interviewees, 15 currently live in	something of a background picture of the
a house at least part of the time, and all	Traveller scene at the turn of the
but three are respectively: ex	millennium. Of course, it is important to
Traveller and the mother of a child whose	remember that the study did not reach
father continues to travel; a protestor and	everyone, and cannot be seen as
active home educator who described	representative of New Travellers as a
herself as "nomadic but not in vehicles";	whole. But I hope it can provide some
and a self-identified Gypsy.	indication of the educational needs of
	Traveller children.

Part Two