Tag Archives: St Aidan’s School

St Aidan’s National School, Shannon officially opened their new AstroTurf/running track facility last Friday afternoon. School principal Patrice Hayes said, “Going back about two years ago now, our students’ council wrote a letter looking for somebody to contribute funds towards an AstroTurf facility. Paddy Purcell of Mincon came forward and said he would be delighted to be part of such a venture. We sat down and spoke with Paddy, who came up with a project called Project Young Eagles, where every class would be timetabled to be physically active for 20 minutes every day. We would gauge the results and see if there was an improvement in children’s alertness and readiness to learn, as well as their physical activity, to see if there was an improvement in that and, ultimately, in their academic success,” Ms Hayes said. After a couple of months, it seems the initiative is doing what it was hoped it would. “We have been doing this since …

JUST 24 people have ever flown to the moon and one of the exclusive club was in Shannon last Thursday, where he spoke to children at St Aidan’s and St Caimin’s national schools. Al Worden was command module pilot on Apollo 15 in July 1971, alongside commander Dave Scott and lunar module pilot Jim Irwin. During his time in space, he entered the record books as the most isolated human being ever, at times being 3,600km away from his companions. Addressing children at St Aidan’s National School, he said that one of them could be among the first humans to go to Mars, if they persist with education. “When you get through college, you’re going to be the right age to go to Mars. Some of you may be able to do that and that’s going to be a very cool thing to do. It took me two weeks to go to the moon and come back. Going to Mars …