Potter star at summer school

FRESH from her starring role on the big screen in the latest Harry Potter movie, Louth teenager Evanna Lynch was meeting with other Irish stars of the future in Dublin yesterday.

She was at the Irish Centre for Talented Youth at Dublin City University where more than 2,000 young whizz kids are taking lessons this summer.

Many of them will not even sit the Leaving Certificate for another decade but already they are showing the signs of becoming Ireland’s future captains of industry such as Michael O’Leary or anti-globalisation campaigners such as Bono or Bob Geldof.

The courses on offer range from entrepreneurship, international relations and globalisation to investigative science, philosophy and theoretical physics, with all the participants identified in searches organised through schools to be in the top 5% academically for their age.

Ms Lynch, who stars as Luna Lovegood in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, was taking part in the fiction-writing course during a visit yesterday by Education Minister Mary Hanafin.

The 15-year-old schoolgirl from Termonfeckin flew in from London after a reading with author JK Rowling to mark last weekend’s launch of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows — the final book in the series.

While Ms Rowling finished her first novel at the ripe old age of 30, one of the DCU centre’s instructors signed her first publishing contract at the age of 12.

Now a mature 20-year-old, Claire Hennessy has a dozen titles for teenagers already under her belt, having been first inspired during a course at the CTYI.

A topic of particular interest among this year’s participants is global warming, following an essay competition on the issue, in which Ms Hanafin said they showed an impressive insight.

The centre also organises Saturday classes during school terms, with some students also able to attend classes at UCC.

* www.dcu.ie/ctyi