Tag Archives: St Patrick’s Comprehensive

WITH high levels of absenteeism among both children and staff during the current wave of the pandemic, it’s a difficult time in the county’s schools. Peter Walsh, principal of St Conaire’s in Shannon said that a lot of problems have to be dealt with. “I suppose there’s more Covid in the community and therefore there’s more in the schools. The children aren’t vaccinated so they’re bound to be more susceptible when it is in the community. “The lack of contact tracing also causes us an issue, in relation to it being pulled from schools. You see the schools replicating what’s happening in the community, I guess.” With teachers absent across all schools, it is increasingly difficult to find cover. “The vast majority would be vaccinated, but the problem is if they are off we are having difficulty replacing them, it’s a system-wide crisis. “We have a supply panel, a couple of supply panels actually here in Clare, but they tend …

REMOTE teaching and learning is still a challenge for everyone involved, but St Patrick’s Comprehensive principal Mary Costello said that a lot of lessons were learned in 2020, which are making things that bit easier right now. She says that there was much more notice this time, compared to when a sudden decision came from Government last March. “Literally we found out at lunchtime on the 12th that we were closing and moving to remote learning. We had done a little bit of preparatory work in terms of resources being printed out, but we thought we were going to close for two weeks. This time, when we came back in September, we had an eye the whole time on the potential for local or national closures.” Classes are longer nowadays, because the turnarounds were proving difficult for everyone. “We have 40 minute classes but it was very difficult for students and staff to be changing classes every 40 minutes online. …

ECO-UNESCO have announced that eight youth projects from Clare have reached the final of this year’s Young Environmentalist Awards. Some of the Clare finalists include CompGoesGreen from St Patrick’s Comprehensive School, The Plastic Police from Kilkee Community College and St John Bosco Community College who are continuing their project ‘Sowing for the Soul’ who won the senior category of Health and Wellbeing at the Young Environmentalist awards last year. St Patrick’s Comprehensive School has implemented a ban on single use plastics and have saved over 12,000 bottles going to landfill since their CompGoesGreen Project began. They have also introduced water refill stations in their school while selling stainless steel water bottles. Elaine Nevin, Director of ECO-UNESCO said “We are delighted at the quality of applications this year and we cannot wait to announce this year’s winners. Young people are still taking eco action and continuing their projects at home, despite the pandemic. In light of this we are holding an …