St. Joseph’s Secondary School Proud of our Past, Confident of our Future June 2019 Vol. 19 Issue 3 Dear Parents/Guardians & Prospective Parents/Guardians, I would like to take this opportunity to thank the teachers, SNA’s, auxiliary and canteen staff for all of their hard work and commitment to our students during the 2018/2019 academic year. I would like to wish our Junior Certificate and Leaving Certificate students the best of luck in their exams. We have extended our end of year newsletter to 28 pages this year to include memories of the extra- curricular and co-curricular activities that we engage in. I hope you enjoy a snapshot of our very busy school community and I hope that it reflects the efforts we go to to provide a broad educational experi- ence for all. I would like to thank the Edmund Rice Schools Trust for their consistent guidance. I am confident that the spirit of our founder Blessed Edmund Rice is alive and well in the community of St. Joseph’s Second- ary School. Finally to you the parents/guardians, thank you for your support. If we can assist you for your son(s) in any way please do not hesitate to contact us. Enjoy a well deserved rest and keep an eye on our new website for details of the calendar and events for the 2019/2020 year. Le gach dea-ghuí, Paul Savage Principal Wishing all our Leaving Certificate students the best of luck with their exams. Check out the latest news on our School’s Website www.droghedacbs.ie persevered We’re all in this together! Our Transition year musical, High School Musical, was a huge hit in the TLT in May. 1,300 people attended in total. Huge congratulations to all students involved and a special thank you to Ms. O’Connor, Ms. Kirke and Ms. Murray. Congratulations to Shane Lynch Shane Lynch was the lucky winner of a 4-day educational trip to Brussels, Luxembourg and Stras- bourg. Shane will be accompanied on his trip by 23 other students from across Ireland and 3 supervis- ing teachers. They will spend one full day at the European Parliament in Strasbourg where they will take part in a youth parliament (Euroscola) with students from across EU member states. The winning students entered the weekly Graduate.ie online citizenship & democracy competition. They answered questions about democracy & local government, environment & waste management, health & well- being, financial literacy, sport, careers, courses, etc. by clicking on links to sponsors websites. They submitted their answers to Graduate.ie and com- puter randomly selected weekly winners, one of which was Shane Lynch. L-R: Shane Lynch, Cllr. Liam Reilly, Ms. Hackett Sports Day We had a great day for Sports day which took place on 17th May. 1st, 2nd and 5th years got involved in a series of sporting activities held throughout the day. Thanks to all in the PE department for organising the event. Build a bank - Boogie Bank The AIB build-a-bank challenge is a national competition which involves TY students coming together to create an AIB bank within their school. Every bank has to pick a theme for their bank and this year we picked a 1980’s disco theme which involved us getting into our crazy colourful wigs, our hippie glasses and tie dye t-shirts. As part of the build-a- bank Challenge, students were able to deposit money into an account on a weekly basis. On 13th March, we had the opportunity to go to the national final in the RDS and give our presentation. We won the Judges Merit Award. Overall, our Build a Bank experience was very successful and enjoyable. Zac Lennon (TY4) L-R: Miriam McCabe, Mr. McCole, Cian Sands, Kenenna Okwara, Zac Lennon, Joe Sayers, Joseph Pentony Black, Hector Sarrion Vina, Mr. Savage, Ms.McEneaney Silver Medal in National ‘Young Economist’ competition! Our fifth year Economics class group have attained a Silver Award in the ‘Young Economist of the Year 2019’ competition with their entry ’Why has Inflation remained so low, despite the housing crisis?’. This prizewinning team consisted of members Lorcan Bradley, Destiny Edomwande, David Einzen- berger, Kamal Ibrahim, Nikita Koush, Godwill Njekwe and Kenneth Obiefuna. Godwill Njewke was also awarded a Bronze Award for his individual entry ‘Economic Equality’. The students and their coordinator Ms Sheridan exhibited the entries and received their medals at a prestigious national awards ceremony in O’Reilly Hall on May 2nd. Congratulations to all. TY Students go to France for European Science project Seven Transition Year students, along with Mr. McDonagh and Ms. Clinton, travelled to Avallon, France, between 23rd and 29th of May, as part of a European Science project called “European Science Camps; Changing Climate, Changing Habitats”. The partner schools in the project are Lycée du Parc des Chaumes (France) and Gymnasium Papenburg (Germany). The TY students worked with other students from the partner countries investigating a woodland and bog habitat that are part of the Morvan Regional National Park. Students recorded data on the plant species, soil pH and nutri- ent levels in the areas studied. Detailed maps were produced using the recorded data. Students from France and Germany will travel to Ireland in September, to conduct studies on a sea shore habitat (Clogherhead Beach) and woodland (Beaulieu woods). The final trip will see TY students travel to Germany in March 2020, along with the French students, to study a bog and a sea shore habitat (Wadden sea). The project aims to compare the data from the three areas studied and show the effects GAA Schools Writing Competition Gaeltacht Scholarships Congratulations to Eoghan A huge congratulations to Seán Maguire, Rory Smith, Oisín Mc Carolan in 6th year who came Cann, Tadhg Martin and Shane runner up in the Irish language Reilly who have all won a schol- section of the GAA Schools arship to the Gaeltacht. Writing Competition in March. Comhghairdeas! Seán attended an awards ceremony in Croke Park with his parents and Irish teacher Ms. O’Connor. Comhghairdeas! L-R: President of the GAA John Horan, Seán Carolan Advocacy On Thursday 7th March, Luke Rochford, Adam Leech and Mr. Connolly travelled to Leinster house to attend a talk given by Senator Grace O Sullivan. We were joined by ten other schools on the day. The talk was about the importance of the preservation of our seas and the importance of recycling our litter. The talk was extremely informative and eye opening to see the amount of work that the senator. Afterwards we went for lunch with Eddie Burke, head of the Edmund Rice Schools Trust, and discussed our plan of action for our school’s advocacy project. Teachers and students from the different schools that attended the talk in Dublin at Luke Rochford (TY3) Leinster House Green Schools Committee It has been yet another fantastic year for Green Schools in St. Jo- seph’s. Under the new leadership of Ms. Conlon and Mr. Connolly and with the tireless work of our students the group has continued to improve our school’s environmental awareness and efficiency this year. Through completing a waste management survey and scanning the school for potential hotspots where needless waste and littering happens the Green Schools group has set the ball roll- ing on a campaign that will no doubt ensure the school another Green Flag in 2020. As well as this the group has embarked on a vital quest to educate the new students in the school on the im- portance of recycling and have shown them the labelled bins for their different types of waste in their designated areas. A special mention must go out to a number of 6th Year members of Back row (L-R): Mr. Connolly, the Green Schools group who are leaving the school this year. Michael Traynor, Seán Carolan. Seán Carolan and Michael Traynor have been stalwarts of the Front row (L-R): Luke Mohan, group for many years and I do not know where the group would Jonathan Everitt, Haider Abbas be without them. Naqvi Transition Year- Our Highlights TY was a rewarding experience for me and one I will never forget. I learned many new skills The weeks leading up to the musical we were flat out learning dances and trying throughout the year that I can use in the future. to perfect the OOo’s and AAa’s song. For example: cooking, essay writing, managing a We spent every minute of class time we GAA team, running a bank, taking statistics, had fixing scenes to make them stage putting together presentations on computers, quality. The week before the musical giving tours and many more. I also went on many we spent every day in the TLT doing trips various places. All of these things were bril- dress rehearsals and trying on mics. The liant but the one thing that stood out to me in Tuesday before the musical we had the sets in and we had our first full dress Transition Year was the musical. Between Octo- and mic rehearsal, throughout we had a ber and May as a group we put together a perfor- few mistakes but we all knew it was mance of High School Musical. Some students going to be a brilliant show. were on stage, some did sound and light, some On Thursday morning we arrived in the built the set and some took control of the busi- TLT at nine o clock and we started ness end of things. It was nice to be outside the straight into make-up, we began our normal classroom environment doing something first matinee at 11:30am we were all that is very rarely done in a boy’s school.