WorldWise News Archive 2009

WorldWise and Irish Aid are looking for feedback from students and teachers on development issues, school partnerships and other related matters. The survey takes only a couple of minutes to complete.

Eight teachers and 30 students attended a WorldWise workshop on 3rd December in the Irish Aid Centre in Dublin. Five DEIS schools were awarded grants in 2009-10 to support student travel to their partner schools. The workshop was designed to help students and teachers to use their visits to develop their schools partnerships and their awareness of Development Education.

Irish Teacher Visit Workshops
In spite of the difficult situation in many schools, 19 Irish teachers attended workshops in Dublin and Cork in early October as preparation for their visits to their partner schools. In addition to the material focussing on Development Education and partnership, the workshops were enhanced by the participation of partner teachers. Three teachers from Tana Haik Secondary School in Ethiopia, who were on a visit to partner Gort Community School, came to the Dublin workshop and took part in activities. For the Cork workshop, two teachers from Bratachari and Aikitan schools in West Bengal, who were visiting their partner school John Scottus in Dublin, travelled down and participated throughout the day.

Although the amounts of individual grants were reduced because of financial cutbacks, the WorldWise Grants Sub-Committee was able to allocate grants to an increased number of schools for 2009-10.

On 25 April 2009, the WorldWise Teachers' Forum took place in the Heritage Hotel in Portlaoise. Forty Principals and teachers, together with members of NGOs and development education organisations had an opportunity to meet and discuss schools partnership projects.

Staff from WorldWise and Irish Aid visited seven partner schools in Zambia and Lesotho before Easter. They carried out workshops with staff and students with the aim of identifying tools for use in evaluation.

Applications for WorldWise funding for the 2009-10 academic year closed on 27 March. Over 40 schools applied for funding, and four networks. The WorldWise Grants Committee will meet at the end of April and schools will hear about funding decisions in May.

The deadline for applications by schools and networks to WorldWise for funding of activities to be carried out during 2009-10 academic year, is 27th March 2009. Please read the guidelines available before completing your application form. Also workshops will be held around the country in advance of the deadline ( see item below).

Apply to us for funding for your school partnership project: come along to one of our Application Workshops, starting in February 2009