Sir, – I read the article on the education diversity gap with great interest (Hajar Akl, "Diversity gap: 'There are no Muslim, Asian or Indian teachers'", September 18th).
While the conclusions of the article were no doubt correct, I have the feeling that the article was narrowing the diversity issue only to minority groups which are easily recognisable due to colour of skin or religion.
Irish media outlets tend to forget about another minority that actually is much more sizable than any of the groups mentioned in the article.
I am writing here about eastern Europeans, who experience the same challenges as all other minority groups, including the one related to lack of their representatives in our schoolrooms as role models. The 2016 Census numbers speak for themselves: 218,000 Poles, Lithuanians, Romanians, Latvians, Slovakians; 100,000 Asian people; and 64,000 black people.
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I am not saying that one group should have better representation than any other. I am just calling for a focus on a whole spectrum of minorities living in Ireland, and not just those which are easy to distinguish due to their not being “white” or “Catholic”. – Yours, etc,
WOJCIECH KOSTKA,
Arklow,
Co Wicklow.