Ballynahinch school head addresses event in the House of Lords

Ballynahinch school head addresses event in the House of Lords

16 November 2016

A BALLYNAHINCH principal has told an audience at the House of Lords about the impact campaigners have made on the success of her school.

Janice Marshall told a gathering of around 100 supporters of the Integrated Education Fund (IEF) about the history of Drumlins Integrated Primary School, which she said had grown from small beginnings to become one of the area’s most oversubscribed schools.

She had been invited to the special dinner at Westminster by IEF campaign chairwoman, Baroness May Blood.

The audience included the Secretary of State James Brokenshire, MPs and peers as well as business leaders and campaigners for integrated education.  

Thanking the guests for their faith in schools like hers, Ms Marshall said their commitment and genuine interest in pupils was deeply humbling.

“Your support helps us to achieve all our extra goals for our young peoples’ learning — to achieve our ‘if only’ dreams, a perfect partnership and one which can only benefit integrated education and all those wonderful young people being educated together,” she said.

“The most important part of our school, our integrated all-inclusive ethos, our collective determination to give our pupils a first-class education, will always remain paramount.”

Drumlins IPS is preparing to move into a new building next year, partly through Fresh Start funding following the Stormont House Agreement. 

The school has spent more than 10 years in temporary accommodation, initially in the grounds of Cedar IPS in Crossgar and later in a former shirt factory, then in mobile classrooms on the Lisburn Road.  

Baroness May Blood added her thanks to IEF donors for their continuing generosity and said the campaign with integrated education continued this year with Killyleagh Primary School becoming integrated.

“These developments, driven by parents, show that the demand is out there for integrated school places, and with your help we will continue to do all we can to meet that demand until our political leaders wake up to reality and step in to fulfil their duty to integrated education,” she said.