IN/0217

Fund boost marks president's visit
By Rosie Uffindell

SUPPORTERS of the innovative Springvale educational village will use President Clinton's visit this afternoon to announce millions of pounds of extra funding for the project.
The £3.5 million gift from the International Fund for Ireland will be just the latest in a series of investments the scheme has won since it was given the green light in April.
President Clinton himself pledged to secure $5 million in financial backing from the US in May, after he described the project as something that could "bolster the foundations of peace".
And his visit today will lend weight to the campaign to raise the final few million pounds of funding needed, which supporters hope will come from donors in the US.
The Springvale project was hailed as a vote of confidence in the peace process when it was given the formal go-ahead by Secretary of State Mo Mowlam less than a the week after the Good Friday agreement was signed.
The campus, which will straddle the peace line, has attracted broad support from nationalist and unionist politicians as well as from the British government.
The £70 million initiative will see the University of Ulster and Belfast Institute of Further and Higher Education joining forces in a bid to give those students traditionally excluded from university the chance to fulfil their academic and vocational potential.
President Clinton is known to be a strong supporter of the scheme and has asked the US state information agency to support the campus with a full range of educational programmes, including a variety of exchange programmes, and to foster links between Springvale and universities in America.
He has already welcomed the fund's latest donation, which brings its overall support for the project to £8.2 million, claiming the fund continued to play "a vital role in community regeneration, creating the conditions for peace to thrive".