Remarks by President McAleese at the launch of the Link Schools Programme 'Partners in Development' to raise public awareness of development issues, European Union House, Dawson Street, Dublin 2, 7th October 2010 [president.ie]
- Published: 07 October 2010
A dhaoine uaisle, is cúis áthais domsa bheith anseo libh inniú. Míle buíochas libh as an chaoin-chuireadh.
I would like to thank Niall Roche, Chair of Link Community Development Ireland, for his kind words of welcome and also Cathal O'Keeffe for the invitation to launch the Link Schools Programme this evening.
Education is an awakening to our own potential and to the world around us. It is a gift and an opportunity that is not equally distributed in our world and wherever there is poverty or underachievement you can be sure there is a lack of education. Here in Ireland the advent of free universal second level education at the end of the 1960's began a process of transformation of Irish life from poverty to progress. Our experience of the surging individual and collective power that comes through education and our generation's long experience of generous outreach to the poor nations of Africa are an important context for the Link Schools Programme. It is a modern manifestation of the concern we have for the children of the Third World and of the faith we have in education as a pathway out of poverty and into economic growth and social progress. It is of course also more than that because this is not a conventional aid package where the funds of anonymous donors help the lives of anonymous recipients. The Link Schools Programme is about person to person links. It is about a journey of friendship, support and solidarity between pupils and teachers in Ireland and in Uganda, South Africa, Malawi and Ghana. It is about developing a strong commitment to global justice, a better understanding of development issues, a respect for other cultures, ethnicities and perspectives, a sense of shared responsibility for ending the awful waste of endemic poverty in our world and delivering an up front and personal engagement between the Link's participants across continents.
Full Story: www.president.ie
