THE US Secretary of Education has urged Irish universities to deepen their efforts to foster peace and understanding in Northern Ireland.
Mr Richard Riley was addressing a dinner of the Irish Fulbright Alumni Association in Dublin on Saturday night. He said that education was not just about imparting skills, but had to have a moral centre, a commitment to tolerance, fraternity and helping the disadvantaged.
Speaking to The Irish Times, Mr Riley, who accompanied President Clinton during his 1995 Irish visit, recalled the struggle to desegregate schooling in South Carolina, where he served as a State Representative, State Senator and Governor from 1963 to 1986.
He noted that schoolchildren "were the ones who had to solve this major social problem". Education could not of itself overcome the divisions in a society such as Northern Ireland, but it was a force which lifted people above the divisions.
He noted that in President Clinton's budget proposals, at a time when everything was being cut back, education was an area of significant increases. While the Republican majority in Congress was looking for tax cuts, the President was proposing that every child finishing high school should get up to $1,500 in tax credits for college tuition.
Mr Riley, a Methodist with family connections in Co Cavan, is to address the Irish Times organised "Spirit of a Nation" colloquium in Trinity College, Dublin this morning.