Company/Organisation Profile
The Donegal Famine Heritage Centre, most commonly known as the Workhouse, is a small heritage centre based in Dunfanaghy, Co. Donegal, right along the Wild Atlantic Way. We opened as a Heritage Centre in 1995 in one of Ireland's original Workhouses built in the 19th century. We have a number of facilities, including a café, an Irish Craft Shop, a cinema, a Famine Exhibition, a playpark and a tourist information point.
Our small team is supported through Pobal and DLDC and CE scheme workers who help to keep the business running in all our facets. Our team works primarily in the Café, Shop and Tour as well as during events and activities such as for large school tours.
As a Heritage Centre, we help to create experiences for both or visitors and our community that allows them to engage with our local heritage, culture, folklore and crafts. Our exhibition teaches and preserves our local history and the stories that have come from both our Workhouse and our community through one of the worst tragedies in Irish History - The Famine, and our cinema allows us to show films made by local filmmakers, such as "The Glass Mountain".
Placement Details
We would like to offer a TY Student a place here at the Workhouse doing work related to local heritage and culture. As a Heritage Centre, we would be focused on teaching students how these sort of businesses run, both as a community hub and as a tourist information point. You would learn why centres such as ours are so important in our current landscape, for preserving and encouraging cultural heritage.
The student would help us with archival work in our office, assisting with tours and other heritage events, and possibly some light work in the shop and café that would include putting out stock and washing dishes. They will be supervised by a member of our management team every day, either our Manager or our Heritage Officer, who will help support them while they are here.
The student may be shown how to use our touchscreen system which controls the audio in our tour and the projector system in our cinema. While we can't provide any skills training, we can provide some tour guide training to our student.
How to Apply
Students can call in and leave their CV and school TY placement details with us or email us at [email protected] for the attention of Róisín