sar logo School Aid Romania 2008

School Aid Romania is a cross-community venture that seeks to help the needy people of Romania.

The emblem on the brooch shows three shamrocks in the Romanian colours, intertwined, as a symbol of friendship, with a fourth, in green, for Northern Ireland.

Ballyclare has established strong links with Methodist College Belfast and St. Patrick's Maghera, with whom we travel each year to Romania.


Survivors of the Ballyclare High Romania Team 2003

It is hoped that the team going in January 2008 will produce a blog of their visit.

Please support all their fundraising events, especially the ice cream over the next few weeks.

People selected for the School Aid Romania Team
in January 2008
 Rebecca Beattie
Amy Blair
Hannah Hamill
Laura Heaton
Rory Henderson
Charlotte Higgins
Clare Hunter
Laura Jamison
Glenn Kennedy
Ciara Knowles
Sian Lamont
Hannah McCalmont
Vicki McCartney
Danielle McMahon
Peter Moreland

Watch this space for the successful 2009 applicants

Since the first trip in 1991 the organisation has:

  • completed the refurbishment of a primary school in Dacia - a village where the orphanage children are educated side by side with the residents.
  • sent five containers full of aid to coincide with the visits and arranged for a distribution network in Romania using the Inspectorate, the Baptist Church, the Roman Catholic Church and the Romanian Orthodox Church.
  • sponsored return visits for educational and hospital staff and provided these personnel with opportunities for improving their knowledge and experience while they were here.
  • provided milk and food to the orphanages and hospitals on a regular basis.
  • sponsored fostering in Romania to prevent some of the children entering the orphanages.
  • purchased a fibre bronchoscope and video-monitor for the children's TB hospital.
  • purchased an audiometer & other equipment to help the deaf children in kindergarten.
  • helped build the Casa Santa Maria House for orphans in Brasov.

Hearing aids and ear moulds are supplied on a regular basis. SAR has also provided training for the staff in the kindergarten.

Many other items, too numerous and diverse to be listed individually, have been collected and delivered to Romania over the past nine years.

This collection of aid by the twelve schools associated with the project has a further benefit of forging links between schools, businesses, churches and others in the local community.

Some quotations from previous years:

... we were very moved by the love, care and interest shown to the orphans; your pupils and staff took them out of their cots, hugged, kissed and loved them and then proceeded to play with them. This would normally never happen in Romania.

... it is nice to know that there are so many people of goodwill in the world ready to offer help when it is most needed. You should remember that, in a country like ours, changes will not take place overnight, as many of us would have liked, but that they will be slow and with sacrifices.

... your permanent presence here will encourage many and will help us to go forward with a new philosophy.

... it takes a lot to make me cry but after I had heard Marvin speak at our assembly I just went back to my room and cried.

... the trip as a whole was the best time in my life. The leaders, the rest of the group, the children, everything was so much better than I dared hope

... I would recommend this trip to anyone who asks.

... I have left part of me in Romania. The pictures of the children remain clearly in my head, pleading with me to return.

... my time in Romania has made me appreciate the smaller things in life, the things that most of us take for granted such as a good home, loving family and friends

... I would like all of next year's lower sixth to go to Romania

... it is a life changing experience.

... once again I would like to say what a great bunch of students and leaders we had the privilege to travel with.

They were a credit to their schools and their parents.

I hope that the impressions made on their young lives will guide them along the paths of life.