Northern Ireland is a small but very divided place. It has only 1.6m people and takes just hours to traverse but it also has 26 local councils and a 104 member regional assembly. So why do so many politicians find it difficult to speak each other’s language? Political leaders, like so many
others, may come from the same town - but they are unlikely to have lived in the same estate, gone to the same church, the same sporting events and most certainly will not have shared school days.
One statistic summarizes the poisoned state of community relations in Northern Ireland: only 7% of its pupils attend mixed or integrated schools. The rest go to schools that are mainly Catholic or Protestant. And it has been like this for generations.
Children from one community grow up knowing next to nothing about the beliefs and concerns of the kid from the other community. Their Catholic and Protestant parents rarely meet at the school gates or at sports days. Is it any surprise then that Northern Ireland is one of the most divided societies in Europe and that most people live in mainly Protestant or Catholic areas?
In the 70s, however, a small group of parents came together to put their children through an integrated school. They raised the money and started the now famous and highly successful Lagan College. All over the province, similar sets of parents have sweated blood to bring like-minded parents together, raise funds and start and run integrated schools.
None of them has to give up their religious affiliation. There is a common misunderstanding that an integrated school is the same as a secular school. It doesn’t mean taking religion out of the curriculum but allowing different religions to coexist. More positively, open discussion is
encouraged and diversity is celebrated.…
