St Colman's Primary takes top award

St Colman’s PS and All Saints NU Annaclone were awarded as a HP Digital School attaining the prestigious Investor in People Award (Silver) for staff development with the Inclusion Quality Award and Centre of Excellence accreditation.

Principal Kevin Donaghy said he was ‘absolutely delighted’ at attaining the award.

He claimed it once again demonstrated the high quality teaching and learning within the school, where ICT is effectively used to support the learning process.

The school is the fifth primary school in NI to achieve the celebrated HP Digital Schools Accreditation sponsored by DE (NI).

Mr Donaghy said, “As a a school we try to be at the cutting edge especially with the use of technology.

“This is being used to support our  education project with Fairhill PS in Kinallan and our European ErasmusPlus project.

“We seek to ensure that we offer our children the best opportunities possible to help them prepare to enter into the global economy.

“If the German government are looking for town planners, if they are looking the finest architects in Barcelona or Air France are looking for top-end engineers, there is no reason why these professionals can’t come from Annaclone or be based in Annaclone.

“It’s an important reminder, we are educating children today for jobs that don’t exist to solve problems we are not yet aware of using technology that’s hasn’t yet been invented.” Digital Schools of Distinction’, is a flagship awards programme which promotes, recognises and encourages best practice use of technology in primary schools.

Supported by HP Inc., Hewlett Packard Enterprise and Microsoft, the Digital Schools of Distinction Award has been developed to help schools to further integrate technology into the classroom.

During the accreditation process the assessor highlighted the strong leadership of both Principal and ICT co-ordinator, at St Colman’s PS and All Saints NU.

The use of the school’s twitter account (@stcolmansps) in keeping parents informed especially with regard to internet safety, the extensive use of assistive technologies and the pupil expertise in ICT were highlighted.

Another area highlighted included the schools willingness to harness emerging technologies, using effective and efficient learning.