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Hugh Mallon, Principal of Saint Joseph's High School has welcomed news of a Quarter of a Million Pound Funding for the school.
Social Development Minister Nelson McCausland announced the sum of just over £258,000 for the school this week.
The Principal commented "I would like to thank the Minister for making the funding available for this project. St Joseph’s has served the local community for over 50 years and today’s announcement is a tremendous boost, not only for the school and its pupils but also for the local community who, through Neighbourhood Renewal and the Extended Schools programmes have access to many of our facilities. We look forward, therefore, to being able to provide enhanced activities for our students and the local residents once the new pitch is completed."
The funding, which has been made available from DSD’s Neighbourhood Renewal Investment Fund, will be used to refurbish the school’s sports pitch providing a full sized facility. This will allow the school to enhance its physical education programme, enable its teams to play competitive matches at home for the first time and provide an additional local facility that can be accessed by the surrounding community.
Minister McCausland said: “Sport develops and enriches communities and there are clear links between sporting activity and improved health and well being. The new playing pitch at St Joseph’s will provide state of the art facilities for use by the school teams, its pupils and the surrounding community. It will help to create a strong sense of local community pride.”
The Minister acknowledged the role of the Newry Neighbourhood Renewal Partnership, who identified the need for the project and the Southern Education and Library Board whose officials will manage the construction contract. He said: “Community involvement is a key component of Neighbourhood Renewal. This project is an excellent example of this in practice: local people, working with the relevant statutory organisations, have brought forward a project which will help address some of the key causes of disadvantage such as access to services and facilities.”
