celebrating youth

entrepreneurship.

Clara also won

the intermediate

category of the

Co. Leitrim

Enterprise

Awards Finals

recently. TY

students Megan

Hannon, Emer

Clancy and Ava Murray also

secured first place in the

senior category with their

product Aquabell. The

students will represent

Leitrim in Croke Park on

Wednesday April 22 next. All

of the students were tutored

by Ms. Gallagher.

A Second Year

student from St.

Clares recently

won a national

enterprise

competition.

Clara Hewston

won the Foróige

NFTE

International

Business Plan

competition with

her fantastic

product ‘Look 2 Cook’, a

recipe book with no words.

She competed against hun-

dreds of budding entre-

preneurs to win an all ex-

penses paid trip to New

York.

Clara created the cook

book especially for people

with reading difficulties.

She photographed every

ingredient for each recipe

and all stages of dish

preparation. Clara has also

donated 5% of her profits to

the Leitrim West Cavan

Down Syndrome branch.

When Clara travels to New

York she will attend a

special Gala dinner

A group of TY

students from St

Clares have

qualified for the

National Final of

the AIB Build a

Bank Challenge.

Michael Conlon,

Peter Poniard, Ava

Murray, Alfie

Cavaliero, Mark Kavanagh

and Megan Hannon

competed in the Galway

Regional Final recently and

qualified for the event along

with Collaiste Iognaid,

Galway, Ballyhaunis CS and

Davitt College Castlebar. For

the past five

months the TY

students have been

running their own

school bank, Clash

of Cash, with the

support of AIB

Student Officer,

Martina Gilrane

and their teacher

Claire Gallagher. The

National Final takes place in

the RDS on April 16. The

top prize on offer is €5000.

Second Year wins national enterprise award

Build a Bank students win Regional Finals

Students qualify as

basketball referees

St Clare’s Comprehensive

Newsletter E A S T E R I S S U E 2 0 1 5

St. Clares hosted an

‘Introduction to Basketball

Refereeing’ course in

December with nine

students qualifying as

referees. Amy Doherty,

Denise Callinan, David

Hacobian, Matthew

Gleeson, Shane Fowley,

Mark Kavanagh, Michael

Conlon, Alfie Cavaliero

and Oisin McDermott

completed this challenging

weekend course.

Ms Gillespie and Ms.

Tighe also qualified as ref-

erees. The tutor was Nigel

Weir from Basket-

ball Ireland, who is an ex-

perienced All Ireland ref-

eree. All course par-

ticipants had to pass a dif-

ficult written exam as well

as completing a practical

assessment. The students

now have the option to

go on to qualify as wheel-

chair basketball and Spe-

cial Olympics basketball

referees.

P A G E 2

The T.Y. students

participated in an

interesting disability

workshop recently. The

course was hosted by

Katie Bourke, who is a

wheelchair user herself.

The students got to

experiment with using

wheelchairs to help them

empathise with people

with disabilities. They

even got to take part in a

fun wheelchair race

around the school. Katie

showed the students some

inspirational videos that

challenged their ideas

around disability. They

took part in team

activities such as a sign

language game of

charades. Katie also gave

the students information

about different

disabilities and showed

them modifications that

can be added to vehicles

to allow people who have

a disability to drive.

Debating Team Victory

The First and Second

Year Boys Basketball

teams had a fantastic

season with both teams

making the Semi Finals

of the North West

Boys League. The

First Year team

came first in their

pool with victories

against Sligo

Grammar School,

Magh Ene College

Bundoran,

Ballinode and St.

Columba’s College

Stranorlar.

The Second Year

Boys team also had a

strong season with wins

against Sligo Grammar,

Grange PPS and

Ballinode and were the

runners up in their pool.

Both teams went on to

play highly competitive

semi final matches

against St. Gerald’s

College, Castlebar but

unfortunately were

knocked out at that stage

of the competition. The

First Year team members

are Dylan Guihan, Oran

Gethins, Kevin

McDermott, Nathan

McMorrow, Stephen Lee,

Andrew Rooney, Sean

Loughlin, Sean Cassi-

dy, Shay Gurn, Chris

Curran and Dermot

Foley. The Second

Year team members

are Vincent Sweeney,

Shane Walsh, Marcio

Oliveira, Dualta

Mitchell, Jack Kelly,

Jack O’Connell, Dan-

iel Lynch, Gavin

Maguire, Cian Fox,

Desmond Kelly, Joseph

Kron and Oisin Glynn.

Both teams are coached by

Ms. Gillespie.

Change is a load of hot

air.’

The speakers on the

night were Tara Fox as

team captain, Megan

Hannon, Emer Clancy

and Diarmuid Reilly.

The T.Y. debating team

recently defeated St.

Columba’s School in

Stranorlar in a

competitive debate on

climate

change. The

debate was

the final

instalment of

the Concern

Debates

competition.

The students

had the

difficult task of opposing

the motion: ‘Irelands

Commitment to Climate

The team had been

preparing for weeks with

the help of the other

members of the debating

team (Ava

Murray,

Conor Nolan,

Aoife

Reynolds,

Aoife Rooney,

Edel Moffitt,

Eoin Kelly

and Alfie Cav-

aliero) and their men-

tor Ms. Hasset.

S T C L A R E ’ S C O M P R E H E N S I V E

Junior Boys teams reach North West Semi Finals TYs participate

in Disability

Workshop

Transition Year Students raise over €500 for the ISPCA

Students win display award at Young Scientist

P A G E 3 E A S T E R I S S U E 2 0 1 5

Three TY students from St.

Clare’s Comprehensive have

won an award for ‘The Best

Display’ in their category at

the Young Scientist

exhibition. Niamh McInerney,

Aoife Feeney and Emer Clan-

cy wowed the judges with

their unique project on music.

They investigated the different

patterns, sequences and key

changes in popular music and

how it impacts on the success

of the song. The girls were

judged four times during

the contest. The project

was entered into the

senior category of the

Mathematical, Chemical

and Physical section.

Ciaran Gordan also

qualified for the event

with his impressive

thermoelectric phone

charger. All of the

students were mentored

by Ms. McPhelim.

fantastic pieces from

First Year to Leaving

Certificate art students

and woodwork projects.

The exhibition was a

great success.

Well done to Ms.

McKeon and Mr.

Donohoe for organising

the event.

The Leitrim Sculpture

Centre hosted an

exhibition of St.

Clare’s students art

work recently. The

exhibition which was

entitled ‘Growing

Artists IV’ ran from

February 26 to March

5 and featured some

and rehabilitation to animals that

have been subjected to cruelty or

neglect and return them to a state

that enables them to be responsibly

re-homed in a suitable

TY students have raised €534 for

the Irish Society for the Prevention

of Cruelty to Animals through a

charity football match. The students

organised a teachers versus students

soccer match on February 13 and

asked spectators to donate €2 to the

charity. The students decided to

organise the event after I.S.P.C.A.

Inspector Kevin McGinley visited

the school in January to talk to

them about the work the charity

does.

Kevin told the students that the

charity provides: “veterinary care

School Art Exhibition

Emer Clancy, Niamh McInerney

and Aoife Feeney and their

award winning project.

environment.”

At the end of the presentation Kev-

in showed the students pictures of

animal cruelty cases, some with

happy endings where they were

rehabilitated and re-homed and

some with very sad endings where

the animals had to be euthanized to

end their suffering.

The students will visit the National

Animal Centre in Kenagh, Co.

Longford on March 27 next to give

the charity their donation and have

a tour of the facility.

A brave First Year student

recently saved her cousin’s

life when he was choking

after completing a First Aid

course in the school. Aoife

Maguire quickly reacted

when she saw her four year

old cousin turn blue after

he swallowed a strawberry

sweet that he had not

chewed properly. She

began giving him back

slaps and after six attempts

First Year saves choking child

Ms. O’Driscoll is pictured with

her Leaving Certificate Home

Economics class who presented

her with a gift for all of the

hard work she did with them

over the years. Ms. O’Driscoll

taught in the school for seven

years and has now returned to

her native county of Kerry. She

will be missed by both the staff

and students.

Students say farewell to Ms. O’Driscoll A TY student recently

qualified for the All

Ireland Final in Cross

Country running. Kyle

Harte won several race

heats in Sligo to qualify

for the five kilometre

event which took place

in Clongowes Wood

College on March 7

last. Ms. Griffin helped

to train him for the

event where he finished

in the top one third .

All Ireland

Cross Country

Running Finalist

The three TY classes are

participating in a Spanish

module which will run for

twelve weeks, before they

go on their annual foreign

tour. This year the TYs are

jetting off to sunny

Barcelona, where they will

surely put their Spanish to

good use.

The students are not only

learning how to speak basic

Spanish, but also learning

about Spanish culture,

geography and cuisine.

The classes are being

taught by the Spanish

native Beya, who hails

from the Spanish

midlands.

In the first few classes

the students learned

basic words and

greetings, such as hello

- ‘hola’ and goodbye -

‘adios’. The next few

classes will focus on

Spain as a country, its

economy and

geographical regions.

Transition Years participate in Spanish Module

dislodged the sweet

allowing him to breathe

freely again.

Aoife recently took part in

the First Aid course run

by the P.E. teacher Ms.

Griffin where the students

learned how to safely

assess an emergency

situation, how to treat a

choking victim, how to

administer CPR and how

to use a defibrillator. Aoife Maguire pictured

with Ms. Griffin.