Northern Ireland Community Relations Council - About Us - News - Irish FA Lead University Workshop Challenging Sectarianism and Racism

12 January 2007

Irish Football Association (IFA), Head of Community Relations, Michael Boyd, was invited by the University of Ulster to run a workshop on “Challenging Sectarianism and Racism in Sport” at a Contemporary Issues and Education Seminar at their Coleraine campus on Thursday 11 January.

The seminar was designed to embed Community Relations into teacher education programmes and fifteen Physical Education Student Teachers benefited from the IFA’s “Challenging Sectarianism and Racism in Sport” workshop.

IFA Head of Community Relations, Michael Boyd, reflected on the success of the workshop:

“We are grateful to the University of Ulster for the invite and opportunity to share with future PE Teachers the lessons we have learnt over the last seven years challenging both racism and sectarianism through our Football For All initiatives. The feedback from the Students was very positive and we hope our ongoing work ignites a passion in them to realise the potential sport can have to promote good relations”.

The IFA’s Football For All Community Relations Department is core funded by the Special EU Programme for Peace and Reconciliation via the Northern Ireland Community Relations Council.