Portaferry Integrated Primary School

Image: © Eric Jones Taken: 24 Jul 2017

Integrated schools in Northern Ireland are a recent development aimed at educating together pupils from across the community. Traditionally, children from a Catholic background have and still do attend Catholic ethos schools organised on parochial lines and grant aided by the Government. Most Protestant children likewise still attend state schools which because of their pupils'and teachers' backgrounds invariably have a Protestant ethos. The integrated schools, drawing teachers and pupils from both communities, aim to teach all subjects with an essentially Christian but non-sectarian ethos. Religion is taught separately. In integrated Primary Schools Catholic children are prepared for receiving the sacraments in years P4 to P7, while their Protestant fellow pupils develop their faith by following the 'Delving Deeper' programme. At present less than 10% of Northern Irelands school population attend integrated schools.

Images are licensed for reuse under creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0