Well done to our girls from Kilkerley Brownies, Ladybirds and Guides who have organised a collection of items for Women's Aid Dundalk.

Well done to our Under 11 and Under 13 quiz teams who competed in the first round of the Credit Union Quiz recently.  While they did not get through to the next round, they performed very well and worked very hard to prepare for the quiz.  They had a great afternoon and came away with some lovely treats.  They were excellent representatives for their school and we are extremely proud of every one of them.

A big thank you to all the volunteers who came to our school to demonstrate how to make St. Brigid's crosses to the younger children as well as helping the older children to make their own.  These volunteers consisted of parents, grandparents and the wider Kilkerley community and we are lucky to have had this tradition in our school for many years now.

The children from First Class recently welcomed their grandparents to the school to celebrate Grandparents' Day.  We had a lovely afternoon beginning with a prayer service celebrated by Fr Brian.  We were then provided with some wonderful songs and poems by the children themselves.  The boys and girls got the chance to ask some interesting questions of their grandparents about their own school days.  The afternoon ended with some refreshments and photos in our special Grandparents' Day photo frame.  A day to remember for all!

Thank you to the children from 2nd to 6th class who represented our school so well today at the Mass for the Launch of Catholic Schools Week 2020 in the Church of the Holy Redeemer.  Bishop Michael Router, our new Auxillary Bishop, blessed our Rowan Tree sapling, which we took back to the school to be planted.  The children who attended the Mass will receive a Sprout Pencil in the coming weeks.  A Sprout Pencil is eco-friendly because the end of it can be planted when your pencil is used up and the seeds inside will grow into a beautiful flower or plant.  This links in with the theme of this year's Catholic Schools Week: Living in Harmony with God's Creation.

Congratulations to our wonderful quiz team on winning the Regional Final of the Cumann na mBunscol Quiz 2019.  They are now through to the grand final and we wish them all the best.  

​On Tuesday 1st October, Aisling Shannon, a Structures Engineer at the European Space Agency skyped the boys and girls in 5th and 6th class. Aisling is originally from Athlone, and studied Aeronautical Engineering in the University of Limerick. Aisling now works with the European Space Agency. Her role at ESA is to ensure that the spacecraft gets to where it needs to go without breaking! The launch of a spacecraft is very tough from a mechanical perspective, lots of shaking and noise and some loud bangs! These shocks and vibrations are the main drivers for the mechanical design of the spacecraft. It is Aisling’s responsibility to ensure that every part of the spacecraft is going to be able to survive the launch. A lot of analyses are performed to confirm this before we ever build anything.
 
Aisling told us about the mission she is currently working on, it is called ‘Earth Care’. The space craft is called ‘Earth Care’ and its mission is to observe Earth. It is a really important mission because it is gathering a lot of data about Climate Change. It gathers data about soil changes, cloud changes, changes with trees and changes with the ocean, along with lots of other data. Aisling told us that this data is then made available for free for anyone to analyse, particularly scientists who are studying changes in our climate.
 
We learned so much from Aisling about what it is like to work with the European Space Agency. She had some very encouraging words for the boys and girls; she said “Just go for it! It’s a really fun job and my favourite part is testing the spacecrafts, I am always nervous but we always hope for the best!”
 
Thank you Aisling for a brilliant morning!

Some photos of the fun from Sports Day 2019!

Scoil Mhuire gan Smál had two teams taking part in this year's Feis Mhuirtheimhne quiz in St. Malachy's school hall today.  Both teams performed exceptionally well with Team A finishing in joint 3rd place and Team B in 1st place.  A fantastic achievement indeed.