JP McManus fund donates €4m to Limerick IT

The JP McManus Benevolent Fund yesterday announced a €4m donation to Limerick Institute of Technology to develop a community engagement facility on campus.

The Community Engagement Gateway is a project of the LIT Campus 2030 Masterplan and will deliver benefits for the wider community on the northside of the city and beyond.

The development, which will cost €18m, will include a 6,675sq m facility that will use sport as a vehicle for community engagement activities, with its core focus on enhancing educational opportunities and pathways.

The institute is working with other funding sources to finalise the project. Planning is expected to be lodged in January of next year, with construction to start in October 2016 and the facility to be completed and in operation by 2018.

President Dr Maria Hinfelaar said: “This donation will kick-start this far-reaching and exciting project and will be a game-changer for the wider community.

“We are deeply grateful and really energised by this award from the JP McManus Benevolent Fund. It will make such a difference and help us to raise the rest of the funds required so that the project can be completed by 2018. It will transform the area and the lives of people living there.

“The project builds on work we have been doing for years in engaging with the community and supporting initiatives that raise aspirations among young people to believe in themselves and stay in education. But all these initiatives lacked a dedicated home and now we are finally going to have this.”

Another key aspect of the Gateway project will be a new public plaza between LIT and the adjacent St Nessan’s Community College — soon to merge with the Salesians Secondary College to become Thomond Community College — which will be used as an educational corridor, a creative focal point for the community and as a resource for public/ community outdoor events.

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