Tag Archives: clare champion

A PHOTOGRAPH by John Kelly of  holed  leather shoes worn out by  Councillor Cathal Crowe canvassing before the 2004 Local Elections has  ended up in a civics textbook, which is currently on the Junior Certificate syllabus. Councillor Crowe’s old shoes also form part of a display depicting Clare’s political history at the County Museum in Ennis. Shortly after becoming the youngest councillor in the country to secure a seat on Clare County Council in June 2004, the 21- year-old Fianna Fáil Councillor was captured by Clare Champion photographer John Kelly making the “V” victory sign through the worn out sole of his shoes. A few months earlier, the University of Limerick student, who was more used to trainers than leather shoes, made the short trip into Limerick City where he bought the famous shoes from his future wife, who had a summer shop in a well know city shoe shop at the time. With the benefit of hindsight, Councillor Crowe …

A CELEBRATION of adult learning will take place throughout the county next week. Aontas Adult Learner Week runs from Monday, until Saturday, March 1 and a host of events have been planned for venues all over Clare highlighting the benefits of adult education. Jacinta Davenport, Educational Guidance Counsellor with LCETB (Limerick and Clare Education and Training Board), based in the Adult Education Centre in Clonroad Business Park explained, “Aontas believes that all adults in Ireland should have equal access to learning opportunities, that adult learning has a hugely important role to play in the economic and social future of Ireland. We know that adult learners and adult learning centres do vital work on a daily basis.” In the last seven years, the festival has become a firm fixture on the adult learning calendar with events taking place nationwide, including anything from information sessions, taster workshops, sample lectures to small gatherings of people who love to learn. She added, “The Adult …

FIVE local women, all members of the Travelling community, have enrolled as third level college students for the first time in their lives in a collaboration between Ennis CDP, Limerick Institute of Technology and the HSE. And while they admit there is a sense of trepidation, there is also plenty of excitement with all of the women looking forward to facing the challenge ahead. Margaret Gannon, Mary Frances Joyce, Bridget Mongans, Bridget McDonagh and Mary McDonagh met with one of their lecturers from LIT, Dr Frank Houghton, this week. Dr Houghton, the Director of the newly established Health & Social Research (HEALR) Group in Limerick Institute of Technology, delivered a four hour session on “Primary Health Care and its impact” in Ennis to the new students who proudly hold their LIT student cards. The students will also be going on campus to attend a number of lectures and to join in with the wider student population of which they are …

By Carol Byrne CLARE Champion Photographer John Kelly has scooped his 12th Press Photographer’s Association of Ireland (PPAI) award He claimed second prize in the Daily Life and People category of the national competition, which had almost 2,000 entries from 112 photojournalists around the country. John’s winning entry, Room with a View, was described by the judges as “a striking image graphically illustrating life for large families living in the restricted space of a caravan. Great thought and imagination used to create this image”. The black and white photograph was taken while covering the story of a school principal who was trying to secure emergency accommodation for the Sherlock family. Caroline Sherlock and her seven children were living in a small caravan without electricity or running water, next to a river and beach at Cregg, Lahinch. Black and white is becoming more prevalent in John’s work of late, as he has chosen to reawaken his passion for the medium he …

  THE Clare Champion’s recent All-Ireland hurling final supplement, A Rising Tide, has received a ringing endorsement from none other than the President of Ireland, Michael D Higgins. The President’s praise for the production came at an awards ceremony in Áras an Uachtaráin last week for the inaugural Get-Involved Community Get Involved campaign, organised by the National Newspapers of Ireland (NNI) Local and Regional and the Regional Newspapers and Printers Association of Ireland (RNPAI). Broadcaster and environmentalist, Duncan Stewart chaired the judging panel for the competition. An avid sports fan, President Higgins made special mention of the Clare hurlers and commented that The Clare Champion supplement, A Rising Tide, was the best he’s seen but he had only managed to get halfway though it. He received an appropriate reminder of his cradle days, when he was presented with a framed copy of The Clare Champion front page for the day of his birth in April 1941. Mr Frank Mulrennan of …

KILKEE based community radio station, Raidio Corca Baiscinn has been granted funding from the latest round of the of the Broadcasting Authority of Ireland (BAI) Sound and Vision Scheme to make a documentary on The Clare Champion, which has been in existence since March 1903. Grants totalling €4.462m have been offered to broadcasters and independent producers to support the production of 102 radio and 17 TV projects. When completed, the funded projects will be broadcast by a range of community, commercial and public service broadcasters across the country. All of the projects being offered funding will explore the themes of Irish culture, heritage and experience. “We are thrilled about this as you can imagine, and I am really looking forward to getting started on it,” Derrick Lynch, Programme Co-ordinator with Raidio Corca Baiscinn, said.