A Fermanagh primary school has been awarded a prestigious accolade from the British Council in recognition of its exceptional work in bringing the world into the classroom through its close relationship with a school in Nepal.

St. Patrick’s Primary School Mullanaskea has been awarded the Intermediate level of the British Council’s International School Award. This award celebrates the achievements of schools that do exceptional work in international education. Fostering an international dimension in the curriculum is at the heart of the British Council’s work with schools, so that young people gain the cultural understanding and skills they need for life and work in today’s world.

The local primary school's international work includes having had a close relationship with KK International School Nepal. Both schools sent their respective teachers to visit each other’s school. Mrs. McVitty and Mrs. O’Connor from St. Patrick’s visited the KK International School in Dharan Nepal, in 2018, and Mrs. McVitty paid another visit in February 2020. St. Patrick’s PS Mullanaskea also hosted the KK International School’s principal and a group of teachers.

A spokeswoman for St. Patrick's PS outlined some of the projects the two schools worked on: "Both schools shared science and ICT coding projects which were then disseminated to all children.

"St. Patrick’s project focused on water and was based on the UN’s sustainable goals for development. Both schools also communicated via Google Classrooms to share their relevant projects.

"This naturally upskilled St. Patrick’s to be prepared for online teaching and learning for the Covid-19 crisis that ensued. The children, at St. Patrick’s gained a lot from these international experiences in terms of supporting their thinking skills, their abilities to work together as a team, and of course, their science and ICT concepts and skills acquisition were at an extremely high standard."

She explained that in addition, the project supported the school’s global education, which at St.Patrick’s PS Mullanaskea, is a high priority.

"The school has had a very successful Comenius Project, it offers Spanish to all children and it also offers Mandarin Chinese through its Confucius Programme. As well as its Connecting Classrooms project, the school has now embarked on an Erasmus project which will see it make further international contacts for children and staff for the next two years," she added.

On hearing the news that St. Patrick’s PS Mullanaskea had achieved the award, Dr. O’Neill, the school principal, said that she was "very appreciative" of the wonderful staff who made this possible and travelled to Nepal during their school holidays in order to make the contacts: "Everybody has benefitted in terms of both ICT and science skills as well as through having a much more respectful and enquiring mind about the world."

Dr. O’Neill stated that the ethos at St. Patrick’s always looks outward and strives to keep abreast of the very best practices worldwide.

John Rolfe MBE, Schools’ Outreach Manager at the British Council, said: ‘St.Patrick’s P.S. Mullanaskea’s international work has earned the school well-deserved recognition with the British Council International School Award.

"We are proud and delighted to work with this great school. Many thanks to everyone for all their commitment to developing international work and sharing excellent classroom practice and resources. This is enriching education for its pupils; and their excellent collaborative projects with partner schools overseas are bringing the world into their classrooms. International work is key support for the development of skills young people need to be the globally aware citizens of the future," he concluded.