Mr. Nigel Frith:

An integrated school follows the same religious education curriculum as any other school in Northern Ireland. The difference is that, like the history syllabus, it is delivered in an entirely balanced way because the staff are aware that there are Protestant and Catholic children in front of them in the class so there is an imperative to deliver the subject in a completely balanced and harmonious way. In our RE curriculum we follow a philosophy and ethics route.

The older the children get, the more we are adopting this route which is fundamentally about not only understanding world faiths and religions but also asking huge questions and, out of that, exploring what one's own values and beliefs are going to be. It seems to me that that is a healthy outlook for children to take out into the sometimes very confusing world in which we live.

In terms of the socio-economic make-up of integrated schools, we often find that integrated post-primary schools attract higher numbers of special needs children than any other sector. In our own school, for example, we have something in the region of 70 children with statements of special need, which is the most acute level of special need there is, and an entitlement therefore to a classroom assistant. Some 35% of our intake are on the special needs register somewhere with some form of identified special need. That is significantly above average.

The difficulty is that because we are competing in a system where the grammar schools are creaming off some of the more academically able children, rightly or wrongly - in my view wrongly. We are therefore competing to ensure our intake is entirely balanced with all ability levels and all gifts and talents. For that reason we have introduced a gifted and talented programme whereby staff are tasked with ensuring gifted or talented children in their classes are offered additional challenges. When a child finishes a piece of work, do not offer them more of the same, but ensure they are given an extension activity which builds on what they have already achieved. We must ensure we are offering extracurricular activities, which might be a science competition or a maths challenge, that allows them to go beyond what their peers are doing. We compile a gifted and talented register every autumn where staff identify the gifted and talented children in the school. As I will explain in a moment, that is also built into our admissions criteria.

I see integrated schools as a great leveller. When we have prospective children and parents looking around, I will often ask the child whether he or she thinks this is a grammar school or a high school. They will screw up their chins and have a little think for a minute. The answer is, however, that we are both under one roof. Therefore, not only do we have all faiths and none under one roof, but we also have those who might have gone to a grammar school or a high school. It is a fully integrated education system whereby every child can then be nurtured, supported and developed according to their personal capacities.

I think it is immoral to rubber-stamp a child at the age of 11 with the words "pass" or "fail". The damage some children carry into their adult lives because they were told at the age of 11 that they failed is irreparable. At the age of 40 or 50, some of them are still carrying the damage to their self-esteem that test at the age of 11 inflicted upon them. It should never have made it into the 21st century. It is wrong that we have a system that still does that.