News

Controlled school Bangor Academy and Sixth Form College’s Young Enterprise Team is celebrating as the top student company in Northern Ireland in the 2023 Young Enterprise Competition.

The High School Ballynahinch, a controlled school based in County Down wins the School of the Year at the Families First annual school awards on 20 May.

The British Council's ‘Stronger Together: Strengthening the EU-UK relationship through Youth Engagement’ project offers young people aged 15 – 30 from the UK and EU, the opportunity to connect, cooperate, influence, and implement change on issues of common interest.

NI children and young people continue to receive significantly less towards their education than children in England, Scotland and Wales.

The Controlled Schools’ Support Council (CSSC) will present evidence on the education funding crisis in Northern Ireland to the NI Affairs Committee at Westminster at 10.30am with EA and NAHT.

CSSC supports all controlled schools which include Nurseries, Primary, Secondary, Grammar, Integrated, Special and Irish-Medium Schools.

Link to CSSC's response to The Cost of Division in NI paper published as part of the Transforming Education programme.

A spokesperson for the Department of Education said: “The Controlled Schools Support Council (CSSC) has recently responded to the “The Cost of Division in Northern Ireland” paper published by Ulster University as part of the Transforming Education (TE) programme funded by the Integrated Education Fund.

Three controlled schools have been recognised for their exceptional pastoral care at a special awards ceremony hosted by the Department of Education and the Public Health Agency.

Tullygally Primary School, Craigavon, Carrick Primary School, Lurgan, and Knockavoe School, Strabane were presented their awards at the Derrytrasna Awards ceremony at Stormont by Dr Mark Browne, Permanent Secretary, Department of Education.

Overall funding for education has already been cut by £70m (2.5%) for the current financial year and the Education Authority has been instructed to identify a further £200m of savings. The solution is future investment in education not the unsubstantiated “£226m” in the Cost of Division paper.

The Department of Education (DE) agrees with CSSC’s analysis of the Transforming Education Paper ‘which it considers to be a flawed and oversimplified analysis’ vastly overinflating the cost of shared education (on average costing DE £4m per annum, not the £95.6m quoted). Read Department of Education NI statement here on the Cost of Division in Northern Ireland paper. 

The critical financial pressures facing education in NI are already starker than elsewhere in the United Kingdom.  Our concern is that the Secretary of State does not recognise that education in Northern Ireland (NI) is significantly underfunded. The impact this underfunding has on the lives of all our children and young people is lived each day by our school leaders and their staff.

Chancellor of Queen's University Belfast Secretary Hillary Rodham Clinton presided over an honorary graduation ceremony to mark the contributions of the principals involved in the Limavady Shared Education campus from St Mary’s High School and Limavady High School.