Lourdes Youth and Community Services takes a creative approach to education and youth work.
Known locally as the school on stilts, the Lourdes Youth and Community Services and the Youth Encounter Project is based in the Seán McDermott Street area of Dublin.
The Seán McDermott and Rutland Street areas of north inner city Dublin have three times the national average unemployment, drugs, crime and economic deprivation.
Administrator of Seán McDermott Street Parish, Father Michael Casey, came to the area in 1978. Immediately, he was struck by the intelligence of the local children and by their lack of interest in conventional schooling in a no prospects environment.
He established the Lourdes Youth and Community Service in Killarney Street in an old disused primary school. It is known locally as the school on stilts because of the way it is raised off the ground.
Father Michael Casey explains that the project provides the area with a creative approach to education and youth work.
We have a population of 8,000 people with many young children, and what all the youth workers are about here is helping those young people to have a choice in life.
Director of the Youth Encounter Project Brian Hackett outlines how the young people attending the school are made to feel welcome. Typically, they ease into the day with a chat over tea and toast. This may take time away from academic work, but has great social benefits.
When the school began, it offered basic English literacy and basic maths, and the curriculum has developed from there. While some students study the English for the Intermediate Certificate, others practise for job interviews. The school and with the craft, employment and drop in centres have become a major part of community life in the area.
‘A Day in the Life of the School on Stilts’ was broadcast on 24 July 1985. The producer and director is John Lynch.
