Panel Discussion 

The day kicked off with an engaging panel discussion about the benefits of ‘Learn with NALA’.  Barbara Hamill from IWA in Clontarf shared how there’s something for everybody on Learn with NALA. Learners can engage at their own pace with learning that has real purpose. There is no pressure on the learner and support is built in. Barbara shared that “if we work at our own pace, it leads to an independent life”.  

For her, the benefits of Learn with NALA for tutors are: 

• You don’t need to start from scratch as a wealth of resources is ready on the platform. 

• The Learn with NALA resources compliment your organisation’s existing programmes and reinforce the learning. 

• NALA looks after the QQI verification, and it is a very cost-effective route to accreditation at QQI levels 1-3. 

Learner, Jody, started QQI Level 3 courses on Learn with NALA in July and is now progressing on to a Level 4 course with support from Barbara and the IWA team. “I’m so proud of myself that I got through it” Jody shared in a touching moment where she highlighted how important her tutor Barbara was in supporting her through it. 

Alison Quinn from Headway in Limerick shared how Learn with NALA is an ‘incredibly supportive platform’ for their learners. The ‘Level 1 are absolutely brilliant’ and give learners a clear idea of how to progress to their Level 3 Employability programme. Through Learn with NALA learners who have experienced a brain injury can: 

• Build digital literacy. 

• Regain numeracy and literacy after brain injury. 

Keynote Address 

After the panel, PJ Gallagher shared about his relationship with schooling and his own mental health journey. As an early school leaver, he would have jumped at the chance to access the types of support the panel were discussing.  

PJ was adopted from a mother and baby home and grew up in a house with alcohol and mental health issues. At that time in the 1980s there was no such thing as the term ‘Mental Health’. It wasn’t a term that was used. You were either ‘Mental’ or you were ‘Healthy’, the two were never discussed together. His experience growing up around this went on to inform his book ‘Mad House’. 

PJ shared that he ‘had another energy’. School wasn’t for him. He couldn’t sit at a desk, but he was a great talker and communicator and later learned that he could easily write a comedy show sticking post-its on a wall or dictating into his phone. ‘That’s writing too,’ he laughed. School might have been quite different if his strengths had been nurtured and he could express himself in his own way. 

He carried a lot of shame. ‘I didn’t nearly die of depression, but I did nearly die of shame. I couldn’t see what my talents were’.  To a captivated room PJ shared that the worst problem in Ireland was that nobody talked about mental health issues. 

First, he’d hear ‘the voice’ in his head. The voice of depression. ‘It is a liar but the most articulate talker and it can drown everything else out. It gets to the point where you wonder how you get away from that voice’ and the destructive thinking that ‘I’ll just not be here anymore’ surfaces.  

Reaching out was key to getting through it. A close friend sent a message to him which read:  

‘No time is too early. No time is too late.  

Call me. All your needs are met.  

You are not on your own. We are going to get through this’.   

That message got him through until he could get a place in the hospital where he would go on to find ‘two or three things that work’ for him. These things are now parachutes made up of who to go to and what to do. We all need our own unique parachute.  

PJ urged the learners to praise themselves and celebrate their achievement. ‘It is so important. It is scary to put yourself out there. Be proud of yourself. I am proud of you’.