Education initiative to be expanded

An education initiative aimed at forming “digital bridges” between schools in the two communities in Northern Ireland, is set to be expanded next year.

ADREAM, which was officially launched in Belfast earlier this month, is an Internet-based drive to encourage virtual collaboration between schools where physical integration has proved difficult because of community tensions.

The ADREAM portal will facilitate intercommunication and ‘clustering’ between schools and will help build closer links to enable sharing of ideas and physical assets.

The University of Ulster is one of the key sponsors of the initiative. Mark Durkin, head of the university's School of Marketing, Entrepreneurship and Strategy, said: "These children will be our students of the future. The sooner they begin to think in an entrepreneurial and innovative way the better able they will be to capitalize on the entrepreneurial teaching inputs we have to offer when they come to university. "ADREAM clearly helps stimulate such thinking and we are delighted to be associated with such an initiative.”

A pilot scheme involving a small number of schools has already been successfully completed and next year the initiative will be expanded. The project covers several areas of the primary and secondary school curricula.

The ADREAM project is part funded by the European Union and is also supported by Invest Northern Ireland.

(MB)