Jack McDonnell is a National Board Director with The American Ireland Fund and lives in Washington DC.

He has many links to Ireland as the following interview shows. In June this year he, and his wife Jackie, attended the Worldwide Ireland Funds Conference in Ireland.

During the visit to Belfast they heard the Chairman of The Irish Advisory Committee, Senator Maurice Hayes and the then Director Ireland, Kieran McLoughlin, make a presentation on what The Ireland Funds was trying to acheive in Northern Ireland under the title of "Binding up the Wounds". They then visited an Integrated School, Hazelwood College and witnessed an inspiring performance by the children of that school.

The rest, as they say, is history. The next day the McDonnells made a gift of $1 million to the Integrated School movement. In September of this year 7 new Integrated Schools opened their doors. The following interview gives you the background to this wonderful committment.

What is your ancestral connection to Ireland?
My father was born in Co. Mayo, the oldest one of nine and was the only one to emigrate. My mother was born in Co. Cavan, the youngest one of six and the only one to emigrate as well. When I spent my 16th summer in Ireland, I had 59 first cousins to visit!
Jackie’s paternal grandparents were born in Ireland and her maternal great-grandfather was born in Belfast. Her grandfather, Timothy Hayes, was born in Co. Cork and her grandmother, Katherine (Murphy) Hayes was born in Co. Kilkenny.

What are your business connections to Ireland?
My company, Transaction Network Services, Inc (NYSE:TNS), entered Ireland in 1994 by establishing a software development group in Dublin. Since 1998, we have also operated a data network for card transactions and securities trading. Our customers include both the commercial banks and the investment banks.

How did you get involved in the AIF?
AIF Board Director George Moore invited us to one of the Washington Galas as his guests about six years ago. As a result, we became interested in the AIF and its work in Ireland.

Why did you choose integrated education as your project choice?
Our interest in Northern Ireland began in 1986 when our son Kevin received an Eisenstein Fellowship to study the impact of “The Troubles” on the teenagers of Ireland and spent the summer there. The paper he wrote highlighted the extreme bigotry felt by both sides. His worst experience came when he stayed with a Protestant family with two teenage sons who assumed he was Protestant because he came from an Episcopal school in Washington. When they found out he was Catholic, they literally ran him out of the house in spite of the fact they had been getting along famously until that revelation. Clearly, something needed to change and joint education would appear to be one of the best agents for change.

A few years back we visited one of the Integrated Schools as part of the Ireland Funds annual meeting and were quite impressed. This past summer sealed the deal! Our experience at the Hazelwood School convinced us that the plan was working and we decided on the train ride back from Belfast that we would use the resources of our Charitable Foundation to support the cause of the Integrated Schools.

What do you expect from your investment?
Someone a lot smarter than me said that the longest journey begins with but a single step. I hope that we have taken that first step on the long journey toward peace in Northern Ireland by supporting the new Lir School in Ballycastle, Co. Antrim. I hope the Children of Lir are an example to their peers.

How important is multi-year funding?
The government of Northern Ireland will not provide funding until the financial success of the school is assured. It is important that the new Lir school have the resources to sustain its operations until financial viability is proven.

How do you intend to monitor the progress of the investment in the future?
Since we make several trips to Ireland in the course of a year, we hope to be able to visit at least once or twice a year to see how they are progressing.

Any other advice you would give projects such as these?
As long as you have the courage of your convictions, resources WILL appear to support your initiative.

To what extent is this a joint decision?
As I mentioned earlier, we discussed the Integrated School program after seeing the success of the Hazelwood project—a poster child for the program! The McDonnell Charitable Foundation, which was founded to support educational causes, was already supporting one of the Mitchell Scholars and a student at the Smurfit School of Business at UCD, so we were already involved in education in Ireland. We decided the Integrated School program needed additional support to be successful and the rest, as they say, is history.