Tom cracks the code Glory for Kilnaboy’s Rory at Green School Water Awards

by Páraic McMahon paraic@clareecho.ie

KILNABOY’S Rory Fitzgerald has been named as a regional winner at the Green School Water Awards.

A first year student at CBS Ennistymon, Rory was declared as a regional winner in the secondary school poster competition at the annual Green School Water Awards hosted by An Taisce Green-Schools and Uisce Éireann.

Over the past school year, over 1,2800 students in 432 schools all over Ireland have participated in the Green-Schools water theme which is sponsored by Uisce Éireann. The water theme looks at developing awareness around water conservation and how to effectively manage this precious resource in schools and at home.

Eight regional winners were chosen to attend an award ceremony in Dublin where they were recognised for their exceptional commitment to delivering water

by Páraic McMahon paraic@clareecho.ie

A KILMALEY student has been crowned the overall winner of the thirteenth annual National Scratch Coding Competition.

Tom Dandoy, a student at CBS Ennistymon won the top prize at the coding competition which is organised by Lero, the Science Foundation Ireland Research Centre for Software and the Irish Computer Society.

Top-scoring teams from schools and clubs across the country with participants aged six years and older demonstrating their Scratch projects to judges at the University of Limerick. Among the themes of this year’s entries were healthy eating, social inclusion, recycling and poetry.

There were 280 entries in this year’s competition, a big increase on last year with a gender balance of 56% male and 44% female. Forty-five students made it to the finals and the panel of 15 judges was very impressed by the quality and originality of the projects on show.

Scratch is a visual programming language that helps children to build key coding skills in a fun and interactive way. The Scratch Coding Competition promotes computing and software development at both primary and secondary school levels and has grown since 2010 alongside the growth in interest in coding.

A senior student at CBS Ennistymon, Tom designed and built the computer game ‘Spaceship Battles 3’ using Scratch, he also composed the score. He has attended the North Clare school for the past five years, his parents hail from Belgium. conservation measures, awareness raising and sustainability actions.

Dr Clare McInerney, Education and Public Engagement Manager with Lero said, “Lero’s support and involvement in the Scratch competition underpins one of our core objectives which is to train software practitioners of the future through interventions at all levels of the education system. It is so important to nurture and develop coding skills and computational thinking among children and young people. What we see in the National Scratch Competition Finals is the culmination of many months of work for the participants, their teachers and their families and the end result is very impressive. Their projects are a convergence of science and creativity and allows them to see what coding makes possible”.

Mary Cleary, Secretary General of the Irish Computer Society commented, “The National Scratch Competition gives young people a chance to show both their creative and critical thinking, as well as their innovation. Technology can be immensely valuable and hold a lot of potential if you learn how to use it and Scratch shows that power in a fun and engaging way. I hope that some of the young people in the finals today will go on to become tomorrow’s IT professionals, but even if they choose a different path, I hope their experience in this competition will help them as they become digital citizens”.

Kinsale Community College in Cork was named the Secondary Water School of the Year, while Scoil Fhionain/Kifinane in Limerick, were the winners in the Primary category. Gort Community School was named as a runner up in the water video competition.

Speaking at the awards, Geof- frey Bourke of Uisce Éireann congratulated all the winners for their efforts to highlight the value of water. “It is truly inspiring to see how the schools taking part in the Green-Schools water theme are setting an example for how we should all value our precious water resources and have proved just how much water can be saved. Congratulations to all the winners and everyone who has taken part in this excellent program”.

Green-Schools Manager, Joanne Scott said, “Once again this year we have seen some inspirational ideas from the participating students. They have shown great leadership, not just in their schools but also in their wider communities. Our Schools of the Year winners have showed a genuine willingness to reach out beyond the schools themselves to engage with a wider audience”.

Among the awards announced at the event were the regional and national water schools of the year and the Green-Schools poster and video competition winners. The country’s top Water Ambassadors were also honoured at the special ceremony which took place in Dublin.

This is the tenth year of the Green-Schools partnership with Uisce Éireann, and in that time over 630,000 students have taken part, attending interactive water workshops or Walk for Water events, hosting talks from Uisce Éireann staff or visiting their local water and wastewater treatment plants.