“50,000: a story of cross-border learning” Dissolving Boundaries Day May 15th 2014
Established in the aftermath of the signing of the Belfast Agreement (1998) Dissolving Boundaries has been promoting intercultural learning across the island of Ireland and creating vibrant school exchanges through a mix of technology and face-to-face exchange for the past fifteen years. We estimate that as many as 50,000 pupils in primary, post-primary and special schools in Northern Ireland and Ireland have participated in Dissolving Boundaries since its inception. In the current year 190 schools have taken part in 97 school partnerships.
On May 15th that symbolic number of 50,000 was highlighted in the Dissolving Boundaries annual event entitled “Dissolving Boundaries Day”. The day marks the end of the school year and schools are encouraged to come together to celebrate their joint curricular work and reflect on the learning experiences. These include the use of Moodle (forum, wikis, blogs, databases and more) for online communication and collaboration; video-conferencing and face-to-face meetings. Dissolving Boundaries is funded by the two Departments of Education and schools are supported in their work by a team from University of Ulster (Roger Austin, Marie Mallon and Jane Smyth) and Maynooth University (Angela Rickard, Nigel Metcalfe and Alma Grace).
In Maynooth University this year for the DB Day event on campus we welcomed pupils from five schools who presented their work to an audience here and simultaneously via video-conference to the University of Ulster in Coleraine where their partner schools were assembled. Following a few words by Programme Co-Directors Angela Rickard and Prof. Roger Austin to the respective gatherings, the event was formally launched via video-conference by Dr Rose Dolan, Acting Head of the Educaiton Department, and her counterpart, Dr Sam McGuinness, in UU.
Pupils and teachers from these representative partnerships presented jointly, expertly and confidently what their projects were about and what they learned over the year. The presentations included a mix of slides and movies including a ‘lip dub’ from one school featuring a Dissolving Boundaries super-hero “DB-Boy” and other engaging stories of cross-border learning among the schools. Curricular topics included everything from Healthy Living to Queen Maeve’s plot to steal the King of Ulster’s prize goat to studies of population and the Irish Famine. Another project featured an up-to-the minute study of the statistics and predictions for the forthcoming World Cup. Pupils on that project were secretly hoping to have their face-to-face meeting in Rio de Janeiro this year, but had to content themselves with a visit to Dublin instead. Other venues for face to face meetings among the participating pupils included Titanic Belfast, Causey Farm and the Ulster American Folk Park.
In addition to the pupils’ presentations, the piece-de-resistance was the screening of a special DB Movie made up of video footage submitted by pupils from participating schools involved this year. This unique production gives a flavour of Dissolving Boundaries as seen from the pupils’ points of view. The extracts are introduced by Goodnews Kuria (St. Paul’s SNS, Rathmullen), Jodie Arkless (St. Joseph’s PS, Carryduff) and Hillary Smith (St. Bricin’s College, Belturbet). To view the movie go to http://www.dissolvingboundaries.org/15/db-day-2014.html and click on DB Day Movie.
The schools representing Dissolving Boundaries projects in Maynooth on Thursday were: Mercy Secondary School, Ballymahon, Scoil Bhride, Nurney, Scoil Eoin Pol, Annagry, St. Michael’s Special School, Castlerea and St. Patrick’s de la Salle BNS, Kilkenny who did a wonderful job entertaining the audience and our thanks to them for the time and commitment not only in preparing such excellent presentations but for their dedication and commitment to the project throughout the year.
We would also like to extend our thanks to Ms Alison Keogh, Department of Foreign Affairs and Sharon Lawlor, Department of Education (NI), who closed the event with their kind and inspiring words to all involved in Dissolving Boundaries.
www.dissolvingboundaries.org