Reporters: Katie Brogan, Cormac McDonagh
Open Night
Thank you to all the 6th class students and parents who visited our school for Open Night on the 28th November. It was great to welcome you all to our school to see how we work everyday. Thank you to all our students and teachers who worked on the night, it was a great team effort from everyone and a very enjoyable evening for us as a school. We would like to remind students who wish to apply for a place at Mercy Secondary School Ballymahon, that the closing date for applications is the 17th December 2019.
Digital Champions
Our Digital Champion Team, Katie Brogan, Teni Dania, Abbey Corrigan and Cormac McDonagh travelled to Sligo on the 26th November for training in digital media. The students took two workshops, ‘Digital Editing’ and ‘Infographics’. The School Digital Champion Programme was launched as part of the National Digital Strategy to promote digital adoption and encourage the productive use of technology by students. The programme is creating an interest in STEM and developing an aptitude for digital and ICT at all levels in secondary schools. The programme is providing students with a platform to drive digital adoption outside the walls of the classroom by connecting with local enterprises and the wider community.
This exciting programme also enables students to develop their creativity, critical-thinking and communications skills. In the near future Mercy Secondary School Ballymahon wil launch our TV channel MSSB TV, which will connect our school with the wider community of Ballymahon and surrounding areas. The TV channel will operate a news programme which will report on school activities and community activities our students are involved in over the the course of the year. Watch out for further updates on this project. Thank you to Mrs. Bohan who accompanied the students on Tuesday and Mr. Conlan who is working with the students to record and edit thier programmes.
U19 Basketball
Well done to the U19 team who recently reached the regional semi-final. Unfortunately, the boys fell short against Coláiste Iosagain Portarlington. This was the first year for this team to compete in ‘’A’’ Basketball and we are extremely proud of them getting down to the final four in the region.. Congratulations to all the boys involved and our coaches Miss Curley and Miss Reynolds.
Chess Club
The school chess club has started. It takes place every Monday and Wednesday at lunchtime in room 29. Best of luck to our students who are competing in the Leinster Chess League. The 1st year league will begin in January and the Leinster league finals will also take place.
Spike Ball
Our TY students received training from Volleyball Ireland on how to coach Spike Ball to primary school students. The plan for our TY’s is to coach Spike Ball in primary schools as they have done in the past.