Teenager James calls for Ministers to invest in better Wi-Fi at Children’s Hospital
By Aimee Walsh
A TEENAGER has called on Ministers for investment for better Wi-Fi to allow students in hospital to keep up with their online studies.
Adamstown Community College student James Casserly is a frequent patient at Crumlin Hospital as he suffers from Cerebral Palsy.
Cllr Vicki Casserly with son James
15-year-old James has issued a plea to The Minister for Education and The Minister for Health to fix the Wi-Fi at Crumlin Children’s hospital in order for patients to be able to access remote working, with schools being shut at the moment.
James’ mother Vicki Casserly, Fine Gael Councillor for Lucan and previous Mayor for South Dublin County Council spoke to The Echo about James’ advocacy.
“James is a frequent visitor to Crumlin Hospital and there has been an ongoing problem over the past few years with the Wi-Fi due to the nature of the building and the age of the building. I suppose the IT infrastructure is not there, so it isn’t adequate to have perfectly working WiFi working anywhere in the building.
“On one of his admissions, James’ was using my Instagram to do something called ‘Jimbos’ Soapbox’ where he highlights issues he sees going on around him.
“One of the big issues for him was when he was feeling well enough he wanted to do schoolwork. Unless he could hotspot off my phone because of the poor infrastructure he actually could not access Wi-Fi within the hospital to allow him to E-Learn”, Vicki explained.
This led to James calling on Minister for health Stephen Donnolly and Minister for Education Norma Foley to invest heavier in improving the Wi-Fi at Crumlin Hospital.
“He spoke up and the outcome is that he went on Newstalk yesterday to articulate and as an interim measure, under their SIMs for schools initiative, Three Ireland are donating sims with unlimited data into the wards in Crumlin to tide them over until the end of school term. I think that is pretty remarkable for a 15-year-old to do.
“He is a great advocate, I am only too happy to help him where I can. He is absolutely brilliant on his ‘Jimbos Soapbox’ on Instagram.”
Vicki says that Crumlin Hospital are currently doing an audit to see where the challenges arise with the Wi-Fi in the building.
“They are incredible in Crumlin Hospital in patient advocacy they are such strong workers and advocates for our children. They are really going within their limits to help provide for our children, so the investment has to come from the powers from the ministers addressing this and making sure it is up to scratch for everyone that is visiting Crumlin Hospital.”
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