STEP Starter Sacks: Connecting traditionally nomadic families with preschool education

A country should judge the effectiveness of its public services through the experiences of those who fare least well. In Scotland, where many acknowledge the education system to be progressive, children from the Scottish Gypsy/Traveller community have been educationally disadvantaged for generations. Frequently, the children receive no schooling or they opt out at an early age.


Scottish Gypsy/Travellers are from a tradition of nomadic communities across the UK, which also includes Romani Gypsies, Welsh Travellers and Irish Travellers. A key concern for communities is sustaining their culture. Most believe that schools fail in preparing their children for Gypsy/Traveller lives. Boys often leave at age 11 to take up opportunities offered through family businesses. Girls leave to be trained in domestic skills by mothers.


Recent research findings (STEP, 2023) showed that the involvement of women was key to developing culturally relevant school experiences. However, the modest knowledge that women had of the modern education system was largely based on their own past experiences, which included an inflexible curriculum and frequently involved racism and discrimination from fellow pupils and staff. The women in the study were unaware of the changes to the system over the past 10 years. For example, while pre-school nursery is encouraged and places are free in Scotland, few mothers took up the offer—to do so would be a failure in their maternal duties. The research recommended that educators collaborate with communities to increase women’s knowledge of the system, to empower them to make decisions about their own, and their families’ education in line with SDG5.


Communities’ members and educators collaborated with STEP to create STEP Starter Sacks, a culturally relevant play-based programme targetting pre-school-aged children and their mothers. A series of Sacks contained materials that encouraged women to participate in learning activities at home to prepare children for school. More strategically, the sacks also encouraged connections between mothers and nursery / school educators. Through these relationships, we hoped, mothers would gain trust and discover the value of education for all their children not to mention themselves. Moreover, staff at participating centres received training about Gypsy/Traveller culture and using appropriate ways to encourage parental participation.


Each sack was colour coded for its contents: , literacy (red), science (yellow) and health and wellbeing (green), each designed to address some known barriers, including:

  • Social rules and routines, helping children’s familiarity and confidence before starting school
  • Mitigating barriers presented through low adult literacy, activity cards with QR codes directed mothers to video content on the STEP website
  • To encourage a sense of ownership and belonging, Gypsy/Traveller culture was explicitly represented in the curriculum materials.
  • To encourage sustained engagement, new Sacks were introduced at four-monthly intervals.


The programme has been running for three years. Over 400 women continue to be involved. Their knowledge and understanding of the current education system has increased and we have evidence of changes in decision-making, expectations and aspirations around their children’s education, particularly for girls.


“Obviously, education is important for anybody but, like years ago, what it was like for Travellers—you'd get married, you'd cook and you'd clean. You'd have kids. That was the women's life. But I don't want that for my girls. I want them to get an education and enjoy their life a little bit. They don't need a man to provide for them. They can do it themself. Obviously, eventually get married, yes. I just don't want that to be their life plan.” Female, 17-40


The programme has had significant impact on the uptake of nursery places as well as school attendance in older children. For the women, they have reported increased confidence in supporting their children’s learning at home. Most importantly, some described an increased understanding of their own agency. They have collaborated with staff, reaching shared understandings of their cultural needs and expectations. We have also extended the programme, opening local opportunities for women to develop their own literacy. These women now have enhanced capacity (resources, skills, social capital and connections), which we hope will lead to future benefits.


BIOGRAPHY

Maureen began her career as an artist and a teacher in Scotland. She has worked in schools and galleries throughout the UK using the visual arts to inspire new forms of participation and inclusion in education. She has undertaken research and evaluation for national bodies including The Arts Council of England, NESTA, Scottish Book Trust and The Scottish Government. She is currently Director of STEP, a Knowledge Exchange Centre at the University of Edinburgh, which supports sustainable education for traditionally nomadic communities. Maureen’s doctoral research was in digital participative research methods.

Maureen Finn • February 17, 2025

36 Bicycles. Countless Futures in The Gambia.

By Ann Beatty • May 20, 2026
How a simple act of practical solidarity is transforming the journey to school in The Gambia’s Central River Region North Policies have been written. Schools have been built. Yet for many children in The Gambia’s Central River Region North, access to education is still measured in kilometres, not opportunity. 

Education for Hope in Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous Times

By Laura Griffin • May 13, 2026
‘In a single hour vast tracts of shaded woodland became a jumble of torn trees and upturned soil, exposed to the glare of the summer sun. Such land-clearing events are rare, but forests exhibit remarkable resilience in the face of disaster. I’m told that the Chinese character for ‘catastrophe’ is the same as that which represents the word ‘opportunity’. And, the blowdown, while catastrophic, presented opportunities for many species.’ (Wall Kimmerer, 2003: 89). In the context of a volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous world (Stein, 2021) what kinds of education for hope might support children’s and young people’s critical engagement in local and global issues? In the spirit of exploring the possibilities of hope further, this short article focuses on the area of global citizenship and sustainabilityrelated education. It will briefly open by sharing commonalities across pedagogical approaches that take up the concept and act of hope more critically, and close by offering reflective questions for educators, with suggestions for further reading. Perhaps it is a kind of hope that is grounded in the present, in future reimagining(s), in ethical solidarity, and an acknowledgement of our deep entanglement with the living metabolism of planet earth 1 our singular home (UNESCO, 2021); a hope that engages with complex root causes and lived realities of multiple overlapping crises in critically reflexive and contextually relevant ways. As McCloskey notes, ‘Hope can fire our collective imagination and critical consciousness as a mainspring to activism and intervention in the world.’ (2025: 3). Commonalities across critical pedagogical approaches to hope include: Acknowledging the context of a ‘seamless single story of progress, development and human evolution’ (Andreotti, V.D.O., 2021b Relating to social and ecological justice and the wellbeing of people and planet Using participatory, action-orientated and inquiry-based learning processes Exploring diverse worldviews and perspectives Practising grounding in the present with opening up possibilities for change (relational, embodied, response-able 2 ) Experiencing ‘struggle’ in different forms (dialogical, selfreflexive, open-ended) Engaging individual and collective agency, action and activism Looking for lifelong and life-wide learning and unlearning. 1 See ‘Co-sensing with Radical Tenderness’, in Machado de Oliveira Andreotti. 2021a 2 See ‘Crossing Borders’ in 2 Depth Education “Depth Education and the Possibility of GCE Otherwise, 2021b. Source: Andreotti, V. 2021a & 2021b., Atif, A. (2025)., Bourn, D. 2021., Bryan. A. and Mochizuki,Y., 2024., Giroux, H.A. 2025., Meade, E. 2025. Whilst engaging in the concept and act of hope more critically reflect upon: What kinds of education for hope might you explore further and why? How might you provide generative spaces for engaging in diverse worldviews and perspectives? In what ways can you facilitate individual and collective agency? How might you support learners’ practice grounding in the present in order to relate differently? In what ways can you support learners in navigating complex root causes and lived realities of local and global issues? As Chief Ninawa Hini Kui affirms, ‘The future depends much less on the images we project ahead than on our capacity to repair relations and build relationships differently in the present.’ (Andreotti et al, 2023: 73. An invitation for further reading: Transformative Learning for a Sustainable Future . d’Abreu, C., Belgeonne, C., Bourn, D. and Hatley, J. (2025) ‘Transformative Learning for a Sustainable Future’. DERC Research Paper 24. London: UCL Institute of Education. Hospicing Modernity: facing humanity’s wrongs and the implications for social activism. Machado de Oliveira Andreotti, V. (2021a) ‘Hospicing Modernity: facing humanity’s wrongs and the implications for social activism’ , London: Penguin Random House. Development Education and Hope . McCloskey, S. (2025). (ed) ‘Development Education and Hope’. ‘Policy and Practice: A Development Education Review’ , Vol. 41, Autumn. Centre for Global Education, Belfast. Link to and download the full reference list here

I heard it said today by a friend that “You learn a language best when you use it to speak and write about things that are important to you. ”

By Susan Piper • May 6, 2026
This summed up to me about why I volunteer for the Hands Up Project. HUP is a charity trust which, through its network of volunteers, connects children around the world with young people in Palestine. By means of online interaction, drama and storytelling activities, it enables the use of creativity and selfexpression to promote mutual understanding, personal growth, and the development of English language skills. I joined HUP in 2020 during COVID. After going to Palestine in 2017, I wanted to get more involved in working with Palestinian children in schools. HUP gave me the opportunity to link up with schools in the West Bank and Gaza. Every week I’d tell them stories from all over the world, then we’d discuss it, play games and I’d get them to retell it. Sometimes we would work from their coursebook English for Palestine’ in mutual team teaching sessions with their teacher. The simple act of telling a story became much more than entertainment. It became connection, healing, and a bridge to the world beyond their immediate reality to help them improve their language skills, and to give them a platform to speak about their lives in a language that connects them to people everywhere. I loved it, every week, seeing their smiling faces on the screen and building long lasting friendships with their teachers. I even went to Gaza in 2023 and met some of the kids I’d only seen on Zoom. It was a beautiful experience and something I will never forget. As hostilities escalated, I lost contact with everyone. I thought about where the kids were and what had happened to them. As I watched schools being bombed, universities flattened, and people killed in their thousands, I thought about where the kids I’d met were and what was happening to them. I kept in contact with many of the teachers I knew and heard daily news of displacement, destruction, hunger and bombing. Recently, I’ve started to link up again with children in Gaza, and it feels wonderful to be back helping them learn after being denied an education for over two years. Connecting with children in Palestine is more than just words. When a child in Palestine confidently tells their story to someone on the other side of the world, bridges are built, empathy grows, and the world gains a fuller picture of childhood in contexts far from peace and privilege. My work with these children is rooted in the belief that education and voice are inseparable. Through storytelling and English language learning, I witness children not just learning new vocabulary, but reclaiming their narratives, believing in their potential, and finding human connection in a world they perceive has abandoned them. And more than anything, this work reminds us all that children — everywhere — deserve to learn, to speak, and to be heard. Links to HUP information, books and resources: The Hands Up Project BY SUSAN PIPER Susan Piper is currently an ESOL teacher in Oldham, Greater Manchester and has worked in education for over 30 years. She is also a volunteer for the Hands Up Project and is the International Solidarity Officer and President of her NEU district. She believes in quality education for all and aims to make her lessons creative and inclusive so that effective language learning can take place.