On November 14th 2012, @ 8pm, The Ireland Reaching Out Programme are holding a Roadshow presentation at the Tower Hotel, in Co Derry. After a hugely successful 2 years, IrelandXO is now embarking on its expansion programme Nationwide. Henry Healy, Community Activation Leader, with Ireland Reaching Out (distant cousin of Mr Barack Obama, President of USA), will be giving a presentation. Anyone with an interest in their community, its history, tourism, business or genealogy, is encouraged to get involved and learn more about the programme. New parish volunteers are always welcome. Please contact tel: 091 842 013 or email: info@irelandxo.com for further details.

 

About Ireland Reaching Out

The Ireland Reaching Out (IrelandXO) programme is an award winning national community programme that works with parishes across Ireland to connect with their diaspora worldwide, enabling people to trace their roots to specific Irish parishes and providing a ‘Meet & Greet’ service. The Ireland(XO) website will provide a profile for every parish in the country, and aims to facilitate connections with some of the estimated 70 million diaspora abroad.

The idea is very simple: instead of waiting for people of Irish descent to return to Ireland to “trace their roots” as is popularly done today, we are looking to help and train local people in communities to proactively research, reach out and contact their Diaspora. This is what we call reverse genealogy. It involves the tracing and recording of all the people who left a community and the seeking out their living descendants worldwide. Ireland(XO) is currently identifying and training volunteers in parishes across the country who will guide returning diaspora to places of interest including family homesteads, grave stones or land connected to their families. People abroad can leave queries on the site that will be responded to by local trained volunteers, helping to link them to their ancestral homes.

 

Notes to Editor

The Ireland Reaching Out (Ireland XO) project was launched as a National Diaspora Programme by the Taoiseach, Enda Kenny TD, in March 2012. The innovative programme has won many awards, including the national “Pride of Place” Awards (Nov 2011) and “Best Community” initiative (Feb 2012) by the Local Authorities Members Awards (LAMA). It also won sponsorship from the Arthur Guinness Fund. The programme was founded and piloted in South-East Galway by tech entrepreneur Mike Feerick in 2009. It has been funded by the Department of Foreign Affairs, the Heritage Council, the Atlantic Philanthropies, the Ireland Funds, Galway County Council, Galway Rural Development (GRD), and Irish-American sources. Sponsors include Google, Guinness, An Post, and the National Library. In Dec 2011, the programme launched a global partnership with the GAA. Well-known broadcasters and economists David McWilliams and George Lee have been prominent supporter's of Ireland (XO) pointing out the extraordinary economic potential of the programme, which rises well beyond the immediate an obvious tourism opportunity. The Ireland Reaching Out programme aims to build an online database of 10 million members of the Irish Diaspora including delivering one million additional visits to the island of Ireland by 2016.