She started at Strangford College in 1998, the year after it was established, and left in 2003. The integrated education movement in Northern Ireland was set up against a prevailing system which encouraged children to attend mainly Protestant state-controlled schools or mainly Catholic schools run by the Church, a legacy which some have criticised for entrenching sectarianism from a young age. Mr Maxwell said: “She came in the second year of the school’s existence and at that stage the school had no funding, none until 2000. It was a leap of faith to send your child to an integrated school of that nature.”