The College Press —————Friday, 13th February 2015 Issue 3 Volume 10————
Future Leader
Young Scientist
Life is incomplete without the College Press Chick Flicks
Fri the 13th
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College Press Editorial Team Editors: Amy Farrell Cara Mooney Laura Hannon Student Contributors: Sam Burke Rachel Thornton Aoife Cudmore Megan Hoare Roisin King Aoibhin Tutty—Bardon
Special Thanks To:
Mr. Doyle Ms. Carey Ms. Davis Ms. Smythe
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Editorial
Hi Everyone! This term has really flown by! Lets hope everyone has held their sanity during the mocks! Summer is drawing ever closer and college life is in full swing. Huge congratulations to our SCT rugby on their ongoing campaign to bring home the cup! Also a big well done to The JCT hockey and the concern debating team for representing the school with pride. Hope you all have a great valentine’s day, try not to eat too much chocolate alone or otherwise. See you all soon, till next issue! Amy, Cara, Laura
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Anti-bullying Ambassadors Roisin King Love is in the air this Valentine's... infecting people like a virus, leaving them in a state of euphoria. Happiness, much like love, is easily spread provided that people are willing to share their joy! And the Anti-bullying ambassadors merely wish for you to share your happiness with others, so that we can all have weeks, months and years of this wonderful feeling. We soon hope to have the coffee dock up and running.. the little old classroom between the first and second floors of Senior House is an unused space no more! With beanbags, quotes on the walls and movies playing every day, it will be the place to be. The plan is to have it up and running in the near future, so keep an ear out for news about it! It is also important to watch around the school for signs of your anti-bullying ambassadors at work. There are now around 30 ambassadors from TY, and we're all working hard to make our school a safer and happier environment to work in. At the moment, small groups are carrying out different projects, which target everyone; from staff to sports coaches to parents. Listen out in the notices for news of what's happening each week, and participate when possible! 4
Valentines Day (it’s not for everyone..) The college press apologises in advance and holds no responsibility for any offending material. Valentines day is just around the corner and for some it is a day of splendour, where one must buy excessive amounts of gifts, flowers and chocolates for their significant other. Failing to do so may leave them facing the world companion less with the forgotten chocolates in tow. It is a day where one may attempt to gain the affection of another, or express their undying love in a rather futile manner. For some it is a day where 'magic' happens, with the valentine pessimists watching in despair or disgust at the lovesick couples. But who can blame them? After all it IS a day dedicated to the saint Valentine, who wed soldiers that were forbidden to marry. In doing so the guy defied his own church. He made a pretty big sacrifice in the 'name of love' so it is arguable it is only right for couples to spend it in sickening awe of each other. Yet for most it is the epitome of cheesiness and trashy love story's to be faced with a wary approach. Watching excessive PDAs is the perfect time to castigate the offending couple while of course indulging in vomit gestures behind their backs. To brace yourself this Valentines day against the hoards of sappy romances you will see left right and centre I suggest to every 'single' person out there; Lock yourselves away for those 24 hours.. Stock up on food, movies, books whatever it is you may need. Be safe. Be secure. And whatever you do, only emerge from your safe house when the day has ended. To anyone courageous enough to brace the frenzy that is Valentines day I bid thee good luck. *Warning all couples out there* those of you planning to head out this Valentines I strongly advise steering clear from 'singles' themed nightclubs, unless you like the idea of being pounced on by a herd of people some what resembling a group of wild hyenas (it may get ugly). Happy Valentines Day!! Cara Mooney
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Rotary Leadership Competition—Aoibhin Tutty Bardon After hastily making sure that everything necessary for the trip ahead was packed, I headed up to Connolly train station in Dublin to get a train to Belfast with 6 other people I had never met before. A slightly daunting task, but nonetheless I gathered my belongings and headed up in the car. On arrival at Connolly Station, I met with six of the other participants. After the 2 hour train journey full of chatter and laughter, we found our way to Jury’s Inn which would be our Belfast home. After checking in with Rotary, we waited as the rest of the 24 participants dropped in over a two hour period. We then got our roommates, dropped our luggage in our rooms and headed into Belfast city. After a bit of shopping we headed back to the hotel where we had a meeting about the week that lay ahead of us and what it would consist of. When we got back to the hotel, we all met in the foyer and chatted late into the night, joined by some pizza, garlic bread and several chocolate doughballs. After getting up at 7:30 the following day, we packed our suitcases, loaded them on to the bus and made our way to the European office in Belfast. There, we were given information about the EU commission and had a question and answer session. We took some photos, gathered some booklets that would help us learn about our given topics for the EU parliament and then made our way over to City Hall. The building was fabulous! We headed up to the Mayor’s Parlour we had tea and biscuits. We then got a bus to Stormont, where we got a short history of the place and then had a rather interesting question and answer session with some MLA’s. Stormont was in session, so we watched that for some time and started our journey down to Dublin. We soon arrived at our hotel in Dublin. We began to present speeches to see who would present Ireland in Strasbourg. I was second up out of the 18 of us who chose to do it. When all of us were finished, we had a vote on who we thought should present, and it ended up being myself and 3 guys who would present our group. We had another early morning on Tuesday, waking up at 7 o’clock. We headed out to the EU parliament offices where we were all filmed explaining what we would do if we were Taoiseach. Afterwards, we had another question and answer session which would help us in Strasbourg. After lunch we bade the offices farewell and headed to our next destination, Leinster House. We had a tour of the building and a question and answer session with a TD and a minister for State, Simon Harris. We rushed back to the hotel, gathered our luggage and travelled to the airport. After some shopping and a chocolate fondant, we boarded the plane and made our way to Frankfurt.
Watch Ireland’s future leader Aoibhín at the following link: http://www.independent.ie/irish-news/education/watch-what-would-irelandsyoung-leaders-of-the-future-do-first-if-they-were-taoiseach-30946533.html
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When we arrived we reenergised with some McDonalds, and then got a bus to our hotel. We had another short meeting and the four of us who would be presenting Ireland composed our speech. We got up at around 8 the next morning, and boarded a coach which would take us on our three hour journey to Strasbourg. We arrived at our hotel, dropped our luggage off and were let loose in the city centre. The city was gorgeous, almost like a postcard city. A group of us had a look around the city and had a lovely lunch in a little French café. We then split up and went shopping- several purchases later, we headed back to the hotel and gathered in the meeting room. We preformed our introduction to Ireland piece a few times, and then we split into our groups again and prepared for our practise presentation for Strasbourg. The six groups presented points about their topic, and then took questions from us in the audience as practice for Thursday. We were up at the early hour of 5:45 on the day of the Euroscola and had a gorgeous breakfast before departing for the EU Parliament. After going through airportlike security, we settled in the restaurant for some hot chocolate as we waited for the other 22 countries to arrive. Soon enough we started filing into the hemi-sphere, which is the main chamber in the Parliament. There was a short introduction and the presentations began. We were sixth up, and it wasn’t long before I found myself standing up to walk to the podium. It felt so invigorating to stand their talking about Ireland to such a vast amount of people. After all the presentations were over a question and answer took place. Out of the 18 question that were asked, 10 of them were from Irish people. We used the voting system to vote on several topics so we got used to how it worked, and then we went out for lunch. After lunch we split into our six groups according to our topics, and went to smaller chambers to prepare for the group’s presentation. My group’s topic was Integration and Migration in the EuroMediterranean region and an Irish student was deservingly elected as spokesperson for our group. We broke into smaller groups and discussed ideas to bring to the spokesperson, and then began presenting our ideas and discussing proposals. It was soon time to return to hemisphere for the presentations. The pride I felt when I looked down to the centre of the room and saw that 7 of the 12 spaces for the main speakers were occupied by Irish people is indescribable! The spokespeople (4 of which were Irish) began to put forward their proposals and after they did so the floor was opened to questions. I managed to ask two questions of the spokespeople. After each round of questions the floor voted on whether or not they wanted the proposals passed. The occasion was over all too soon, and we climbed onto our coach on a high once again and headed back to the hotel.We went out to a French restaurant for dinner and were treated to a three course meal as celebration. Once we were back in the hotel, we all gathered together and listened to some great musical talent from the group, watched a spectacular Irish dance and shared our experiences from the trip. Tears began to flow from numerous eyes! We got ready for bed and then piled into one of the rooms. People began to drift off to get some sleep, but a group of us just stayed up - we heard the wakeup call and took that as our cue to begin to get ready to leave. We ate our breakfast on the bus to the airport and slept on the plane home. As we collected our luggage there were more tears- I hated leaving the people I had gotten to know so well over a week and had shared such an incredible experience with. It completely surpassed all expectations I had, and I definitely recommend any eligible students to go for it next year! 7
Chick Flicks—Sam Burke So, Valentine’s Day is just on the horizon and amongst all the chocolates, flowers and sappy cards that’ll be flying off the shelves this weekend, you’ll probably be wanting some entertainment too. So, to tide you all over for the weekend, here’s a list of the best chick flicks. 1.Bridesmaids: Easily one of the funniest chick flicks ever made. Well written, well acted and it’s packed full of great moments that will leave you in stitches. 2.Mean Girls: What’s great about Mean Girls is its characters. Each of the people in this movie are all wildly different from each other, and really they’re the ones that make this film worth watching. 3. Dirty Dancing: How can you go wrong with a bit of 80’s goodness? So many things from this movie have carried over into pop culture, from the ending song to the multitude of quotes. If you’re in the mood for a bit 80’s cheese, give it a watch. 4. Sister Act: Right, let’s break this down for a second. A singer who witnesses a mob crime, gets sent off to a nunnery, then is tasked with putting together a concert, comprised of singing nuns, for the Pope…I will take that with a slice of cake please. 5. Any “Meg Ryan” movie: I could list off a chick flick that Meg Ryan has appeared in, but honestly, there’s way too many of them. You could practically marathon all of her chick flicks this Valentine’s weekend and still have some left over. So really you should just watch any of them. 8
Young Scientist This year I competed at the BT Young Scientist and technology exhibition in the RDS in Dublin. It was my first time in the competition and I entered a project on my own. It was great having Aoife Ryan there doing her project as well. The title of my project was “An Investigation into the negative effects of contact lenses on Sports,” but really it was more an investigation into whether glasses or contact lenses would give someone who needs corrective lenses an edge in their sports performance. I measured this by having volunteers from the school (who wore contact lenses) do simple sports related tests, such as throwing or catching a ball. The results show that volunteers preformed slightly better using their contact lenses for catching a ball and hitting a ball with a baseball bat, while they performed better wearing their glasses when throwing a ball at a target and taking football penalties. The exhibition was so much fun. Aside from getting three days off school, we made so many new friends and learnt a lot from our time there. I would really encourage anyone to enter the competition – you don’t even have to be amazing at science. Though I didn’t win any prizes, I was really proud to be one of the 550 projects that were chosen to compete out of 2077 projects from throughout the country. I’d just like to thank all of my 5 th year volunteers for helping me throughout the project, as well as Ms. Davis and Mr. Walsh. Aoife Cudmore
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Valentines 2015 - Megan Hoare So it’s that time of year again, yes indeed the time for too many PDA’s, giant teddy bears and the valentine hashtag to explode all over social media. f\or all the single people out there, it’s time to get the couples combo at the cinema with your best friend or, sit at home watching Netflix while eating Ben and Jerry’s and thinking up your great plans for next year…again. So to help everyone get through the three day long first year relationships and painfully cheesy valentines cards to the most important day of the year, February 15th (the day all the ridiculously priced chocolates goes on sale), here are some Valentines jokes and puns.
So if any of you happen to stumble upon a valentine in the next week, feel free to use any of these cringe-worthy quotes while the rest of us belt out “Blank Space” at the top of our lungs. Have a great mid-term and, I hope everyone enjoys their valentine’s day no matter how they spend it!
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Just for fun!
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Roses are red, violets are blue Oh hi! A boy! How do you do? Tulips are yellow, daisies are white, Kay, here’s my number, text me tonight Sunshine in summer, flowers in May I think we’ve been dating for, like a day Birds will all sing, butterflies will fly We’re going to be together ‘till the day we die! Clear skies are blue, dark clouds are grey “Hey gals <3 no filter #selfiewithbae” Full moons are silver, cold nights are black Oh my god, why isn’t he texting me back? Boys are all sweet, boys are all hot Talk to me! Do you like hate me or what? Smiles turn to scowls, glee turns to glare Fine! Don’t talk to me! See if I care! Boys are all horrible, boys are all dim So what? I’m so much happier without him Teardrops are flowing, drowning in its sea OH MY GOD! WHY WOULD HE DO THIS TO ME?!? Machine guns are powerful, bullets are cheap I SWEAR TO GOD, I’M GOING TO KILL HIM IN HIS SLEEP! Knife blades are sharp, dead bodies will smell ONE DAY, I’M GOING TO MAKE HIM BURN IN HELL! Lips are now smiling, tear ducts won’t cry, I’m an independent woman and I don’t need no guy Roses are red, violets are blue Hi! Another boy! How do you do? By Rachel Thornton
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Miscelleny Valentine cards, chocolates, flowers, red hearts and romance. That's what Valentine's Day is all about, right? Well, maybe not. A man named Valentinus was martyred on February 14 late in the third century A.D. — this much we know. But when it comes to details about the life of St. Valentine, legend often supersedes fact. The St. Valentine who inspired the holiday may have been two different men. Officially recognized by the Catholic Church, St. Valentine is known to be a real person who died around A.D. 270. However, his true identity was questioned as early as A.D. 496 by Pope Gelasius I, who referred to the martyr and his acts as “being known only to God.” One account from the 1400s describes Valentine, a priest, who was beheaded near Rome by the emperor Claudius II for helping Christian couples, particularly roman soldiers, to wed. Claudius had issued an edict preventing the marriage of young couples. A different account claims Valentine was the Bishop of Terni, also martyred by Claudius II on the outskirts of Rome. Because of the similarities of these accounts, it’s thought they may refer to the same person. Enough confusion surrounds the true identity of St. Valentine that the Catholic Church discontinued liturgical veneration of him in 1969, though his name remains on its list of officially recognized saints. In all, there are about a dozen St. Valentines, plus a pope. The saint we celebrate on Valentine’s Day is known officially as St. Valentine of Rome in order to differentiate him from the dozen or so other Valentines on the list. Because “Valentinus”—from the Latin word for worthy, strong or powerful— was a popular moniker between the second and eighth centuries A.D., several martyrs over the centuries have carried this name. The official Catholic roster of saints shows about a dozen who were named Valentine or some variation thereof. The most recently beatified Valentine is St. Valentine Berrio-Ochoa, a Spaniard of the Dominican order who traveled to Vietnam, where he served as bishop until his beheading in 1861. Pope John Paul II canonized BerrioOchoa in 1988. There was even a Pope Valentine, though little is known about him except that he served a mere 40 days around A.D. 827.
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You can find Valentine’s skull in Rome. The flower-adorned skull of St. Valentine is on display in the Basilica of Santa Maria in Cosmedin, Rome. In the early 1800s, the excavation of a catacomb near Rome yielded skeletal remains and other relics now associated with St. Valentine. As is customary, these bits and pieces of the late saint’s body have subsequently been distributed to reliquaries around the world. You’ll find a relic of St. Valentine and shrine (pictured) in the Carmelite Church, Whitefriar Street, Dublin – just off Temple Bar. Chaucer may have invented Valentine’s Day as we know it. The medieval English poet Geoffrey Chaucer, of Canterbury Tales fame, often took liberties with history, placing his poetic characters into fictitious historical contexts that he represented as real. No record exists of romantic celebrations on Valentine’s Day prior to a poem Chaucer wrote around 1375. In his work “Parliament of Foules,” he links a tradition of courtly love with the celebration of St. Valentine’s feast day–an association that didn’t exist until after his poem received widespread attention. The poem refers to February 14 as the day birds (and humans) come together to find a mate. When Chaucer wrote, “For this was sent on Seynt Valentyne’s day / Whan every foul cometh ther to choose his mate,” he may have invented the holiday we know today. Well, here’s to whoever makes you swoon or your knees wobble!! Have
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lovely Valentine’s Day and enjoy your mid-term break.
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Feeling inspired???
Why not take part in the "Feeling the Heat" Trócaire and Poetry Ireland Poetry Competition 2015
World Book Day takes place Thursday the 5th of March, ask your English teacher for more details and get reading!
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