Portadown Integrated Primary
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Portadown Integrated Primary is a primary school which opened in Portadown, Northern Ireland in 1990.
When first opened the school was housed in portacabins in Chambers Park, home of Portadown RFC. Initially it had a small number of pupils, around 20-30, and lunch was held in the rugby changing rooms. The first head teacher was Mrs Maghee. After growing quite rapidly, it moved to a new semi-perminant building in 1992 in Kernan. There are currently 223 pupils enrolled.
It was one of the first primary schools in the Portadown area that openly educated children from Roman Catholic and Protestant communities together. Education in Northern Ireland was and is still heavily segregated. Integrated Education seeks to encourage an end to religious segregation, and understanding between differing communities.
It was opened by by The North Armagh Group for Integrated Education (NAGIE), and supported by The Northern Ireland Council for Integrated Education. According to 'In the Frame' it was a grant maintained integrated primary school, which means it comes under the direct authority of the Department of Education for Northern freland (DENI), though for the first few years it was not directly funded by any education authority.
