I believe open ports on netgamers are 6665-6669 and 8080. Try connecting through one of them, it's possible (unlikely) your network only has the default 6667 blocked.
Alternatively find an irc proxy you can bounce through on port 80. Failing that - if you've moved away from home to go to uni, see if you can set one up on your old PC on your old connection. I would elaborate further, but honestly, if you need further instructions, then this option probably isn't for you.
You could also go hit up the IT techs, they might be sympathetic, IRC is hardly obscure traffic.
If all else fails, you'll just have to stomach a web client unfortunately.