Contents:
• JCPA Certificate Presentation
• Community Clean Up
• TY Howth Trip
• Visit to DCU
• Sports Day
• Gaisce Trip
• Easter Egg Hunt
• LIFT Program
• 1922-2022 Centenary
• TY Graduation Day and Awards
• Final Word
The final element of the Junior Cycle of School is the presentation of the JCPA Certificate.
This was later than usual this year and normally parents are invited to attend for this presentation but this year parents were being invited in for TY Graduation at end of May so a low key event was planned. All TYs gathered in B1/B2 and everyone was treated to hot chocolate/tea/coffee or water and fresh made cookies from John in Cafeteria. We were invited to make a donation of €1 if we wanted towards Alzheimer’s Society.
There was then an explanation of the purpose and the different elements of the JCPA from Mr. Abrahamian. Ms. Guinan and Ms. Fields also were present and spoke. Them the certificates were presented by the Principal, Ms. O’Neill, as Ms. NíMhuineacháin and Ms. Guinan called out the names based on JC base Classes. We had a really nice morning and we took are certificates home. We are now officially Senior Cycle students.
On Wednesday April 19th, transition years participated in a community clean up. TY's were split up into groups and picked up litter from different areas in Raheny.
Students cleaned from St Anne's Park to Cara Hall and around the Santry River, next to Supervalu. It's really important to give back to our community, in whatever way we can, and this was a good start. We had the perfect weather for the day which kept everyone's spirits up.
Ms Macklin and Mr Nolan were the teachers that organised it and also worked along side us. It was hard work but rewarding and good fun!
Some of us got the great opportunity to join Ms. Lafferty’s geography class on a hike around Howth.
We left after little break, at 11am, and the weather was just lovely. The sun was out all day and it really made a good walk even better.
We started off at Howth train station and Ms. Lafferty warned that it was all uphill from here! She wasn’t joking... the hike started off on a steep uphill walk and some of us were already out of breath. Little did we know the hike hadn’t even start yet, we were only just beginning the walk to the summit.
We passed some very big houses and I enjoyed seeing what they all looked like, I wouldn’t mind living there one day. We finally got to the summit and we had a pit stop, ate lunch and once fuelled up with food we got ready to start the real hike. All our Hoods went up so the wind wouldn’t mess with our hair (very important) and we set off
To be honest I thought it would have been steeper but it was a good walk, a little rocky but nothing too bad. We all took loads of photos of the great views around us and selfies with our friends, and the media team made loads of posts and tiktoks. The sun was still beaming, leaving some of us all a little sunburned at the end, but it was worth it All of us enjoyed some great laughs on the walk but near the end we were so tired of walking! Ms. Lafferty had mercy on us and allowed us to head ‘home’ at 2:40 Some of the girls went to Póg, got food, sat on the grass and recouped. This was a perfect end to the day!
Overall it was such an enjoyable day out to Howth, all of us had great fun. Thank you to Ms.Lafferty for organising this lovely day.
On Thursday, May 4th, the transition year students went to the DCU open day. We were given the opportunity to explore the campus and attend many different talks about possible courses. We were given tote bags, with some little treats, and a map with a list of the talks available. Each talk was around 15-20 minutes long and with most of them there was also brief tour afterwards.
There were a lot of different options to chose from but most of them fell under these categories.
-Humanities and Social Science
-Engineering and Computing
-Education
-Business
-Science and Health
In my opinion the open day was a very great idea. It was a chance for TY students to start thinking about their futures, about college courses and college life and what possible careers and areas of work you may want to persue in the future.
It was a very enjoyable experience overall. Everyone was very friendly and helpful and the talks were very informative.
On May 3rd it was Sports Day. It was a fabulous day for sports day to take place, the weather was just perfect.
All classes were brought to the hockey pitch at 9:00am. From 9:00- 10:40 all the track and field events took place. Each year was called up by Ms Cassidy on the megaphone and they had to go to their designated area for their event to take place.
Most of the transition year students signed up for different events, for example, 100m race, 200m race, shot-putt, high jump and relay races. It was great to see so many students getting involved in all these events.
After all those events were finished with, we had our break time until 11:10. After break everyone was to be back on the hockey pitch to do fun activities. This time there were many different ‘fun’ activities to take part in; like tug of war, sack race, three legged race and so on. Everyone had so much fun doing all these activities.
Then came the student vs. teacher football match.
Both teams had an amazing entrance song and then they started the warm-ups. The match began and the teachers scored the first goal! However this just made the students power up and drive on, more determined than ever to win the game.
The students got right back into it with an amazing goal. With the scores even both teams were giving it their all. There was some great teamwork shown in the match and some amazing blocks and strikes.
With less than 10 minutes to go in the match, the teachers scored a goal which brought the score line to 2-1 to the teachers. The game finished on that score, the teachers winning.
It was a very fair match and well done to both the teachers and students who took part in the match and made it a great memory for the people watching.
Thank you to Ms. Cassidy and Ms. Fagan for all their hard work in organising the day.
On Tuesday the 25th of April a group of 34 TY’s completed our Gaisce Hike.
We all met at Howth DART station at 9.30am. We walked through the village towards Baldcadden road then up to Howth head.
The sun was shining and it was a beautiful day to look at the views of Howth. We walked to the lighthouse then had a quick lunch before we continued our hike. We walked past a lot of really big fancy houses. We had another lunch break at a little beach. We were all energised and ready to continue. We were on the home stretch now! We all began to feel it now. The hike began to get a bit more difficult as the incline increased but we were nearly there. We did 14km in total. We finally finished and everyone was delighted! It was a great day and everyone enjoyed it as the pictures show.
On the last day before the Easter holidays TYs took part in a competitive and high-paced Virtual Easter Egg Hunt.
This fun activity was organised the B-Positive Committee. This committee is run by Ms. Guinan and has 13 members of TY students who want to fuel a positive outlook of school throughout the year.
We organise different games and activities throughout the year, with the aim of keeping students motivated and having a good time in the school environment.
On the day each group was divided into teams of approximately four. The teams had to complete a different puzzle for each round; word searches, anagrams, mirrored words and more. The answer to each puzzle was a location in the school where pictures of Easter Eggs were laid. The first team to solve the clue got to run to the location and find the eggs. When they returned to the gym with the paper eggs, they could exchange them for a real chocolate egg of their choice.
It was a really fun way to spend the afternoon, with chocolate, karaoke and lots of laughs!!
There are some of the clues on the next pages for you to try again...
Recently TYs were given the opportunity to take part in the LIFT Leadership Program, hosted by Ms. Cleary. The aim of the program is to learn valuable skills about becoming a better leader, and to ultimately become a Facilitator of the program.
In order to become a Facilitator, we had to complete three of the topics in our LIFT workbooks. As a group we completed the three aspects: Listening, Positive Attitude and Respect. These are all very important aspects of leadership.
The different topics were completed in the form of roundtables. In groups of four, one person would be the Facilitator for the topic. We would each read a paragraph aloud, highlighting the points or phrases that stood out to us most. We would look at how we could positively change our actions in the next 48 hours, to become better listeners, more positive and more respectful. It was clear by the end of the program, our attitudes had changed in regard to leadership, and we had all grown and learnt a lot.
Those that have completed the program are now certified LIFT Facilitators. We can now administrate LIFT sessions to younger years, and hopefully change our actions and attitudes to become better leaders.
The TYs who are now certified Facilitators are:
100 Years ago the war of Independence ended and The Irish Free State was established.
To mark the occasion of the centenary the TY history class hosted a whole school assembly, presenting different features of the establishment of the new state.
There are many students in our school who have family members involved in the different events that lead to the establishment of the Free State. Some of these students, from each year 1st to 6th, also spoke at the assembly.
The video recording of the pieces read at this assembly is attached to this email for you to listen to. We hope you enjoy it.
A special thanks to Ms. Behan and Mr. Gorman who put in such efforts to make it a memorable assembly. Thanks also to the TY class who were so eloquent.
The Graduation marked the end of our 4th year and showed just some of the different experiences and opportunities that we were offered in TY. It really was a year for us all to grow and develop as people and a huge thank you to Ms. Ní Mhuineacháin who coordinated all the activities for us and made this such a special year.
Ms. Ní Mhuineacháin to present Gaisce Certificates. Names called by Mr. JJ Nolan
Certificates for EPAS/ Special awards/ DELF Certificates presented by Ms G. Kelly
Ms Cleary to present LIFT Certificates
Ms. Crowley to announce Portfolio Awards Presented by Ms O’Neill
Ms. Cleary to announce Special Merit Awards Presented by Ms. O’Neill.
Sport Award – Presented by Ms Fagan
Ms. Dunwoody to announce awards to our foreign exchange students. Presented by Ms O’Neill
Spirit of TY Award and TY Student of the year: Announced by Ms Dunwoody. Presented by Ms O’Neill
Roll call read by Ms Guinan: 4P, 4Q, 4R, 4S
Presentation of certificates & medals to full year group by TY Team.
Closing Remarks Ms. O’Neill
TY’s sing medley from the musical
The following is a list of all the different speakers. Students spoke on just a sample of the different opportunities offered in TY.
• Welcome and introduction of TY Team – Ms Ní Mhuíneacháin.
• MC’s – Leticia Sousa + Summer Sweeney
• Speakers for the Musical – Ella Harris, Layla Connolly, Toni Grant
• Speakers regarding Trips.
o Delphi- Maria Wren
o Ski Trip – Cuileann Monaghan
• Speakers for Work Experience and Community Action –Róise Ní Laoire + Saoirse Walsh
• Gaisce – Anna Cotter to talk about Gaisce.
• Maia Dowling + Keila Cagney to talk about EPAS
• Juliette Allen, Jennifer Grimes, Niamh Bell to talk about Compute TY Mini Med Steps Engineering Programmes
• Katie Teefy to talk about the Hygiene Drive
• Sarah Conroy + Heather Small to talk about Eco-Unesco
• Keeva Mathews to talk about the Smile Committee •
• Media Team present the Most Likely Awards followed by 3 minute video
• Grace Collier – to talk about In school and out of school activities
• Colleen Efekodo – to talk about LIFT Program.
• Megan McGloin + Claire Nolan –to talk about the Peer Education Programme
Portfolio
Laura Grane
Shiyan Yu
Jewel Wenzel
Deborah Efekodo
Summer Sweeney
Megan McGloin
Special Merit
(Organised many events by themselves, got involved etc.)
Róise Ní Laoire
Aimee Foley
Niamh Abbott
Ava Malone
Juliette Allen
Anna Cotter
Saoirse Walsh
Maria Wren
• Grace Collier 4S
• Demi Moran 4P
• Rebecca Perkins 4R
• Claire Nolan 4Q
Foreign Students
• Gemma Fuertes
• Laura Grane
• Mia Rietzrother
• Onintza
Sports Student
Student of the Year
Spirit of TY
• Isabelle Dowling
• Jennifer Grimes
• Katie Teefy
Congratulations Girls on a wonderful Transition Year. I really was impressed with how you engaged and participated this year. I hope you all thoroughly enjoyed your TY and have some wonderful memories.
Next August will see the start of 5th Year, the Leaving Certificate course and, as we know, lots of hard work!
But right now we have ice-cream and the days of summer to look forward to... enjoy!
See you all in 5th year, AM Guinan
