January 23rd, 2018

Achievements To Date:

It is wonderful for the students to see from all their hard work what they have achieved to date.

• Litter and Waste flag achieved.
• Compliments from the Tidy Towns committee in our village and our wonderful work at keeping the school grounds clean and litter free.
• The introduction of a school garden which each year since its creation has produced beautiful fresh vegetables and fruit which we
• distribute in our local community.
• The introduction of the 'Compost Pig' has been such a learning experience for the students. They are amazed by how such compost is produced by a simple job they do daily in collecting all the food waste and placing it into the pig.  The joy is immense the day when its spread out on the garden.
• They have completed their project on  energy saving initiatives which is displayed on the notice board.
•  They have created a wonderful energy saving slogan - 'Energy Misused can't be Excused! See picture on our Website home page.
• Completed LOLO (Last Out Lights Off) which is working really well - creates more awareness.
• We had a 'Car of the Future' day back in April 2017. Local car sales company came with an electric car and explained how is was both a cost and energy saving way of travelling.
• Staff and students of the school have completed SEAI (Sustainable Energy Association of Ireland) workshops.
• Gavin Harte of 'Pedal Energy' came to the school.  He showed the students how pedaling an electric bicycle they were able to produce energy to make smoothies. 
• Students have created posters to increase awareness of energy consumption around the school.
• They also ran an 'Appliances need a rest' campaign.
• Our most tangible achievement has been the reduction in our oil consumption. We have reduced down from 52671 liters in 2016 to 39541 liters in 2017- reduction of 29.4%.
• Another tangible achievement has been the reduction of electricity used.  We have reduced as follows: Sept-Nov 2016 1408kwhs Sept-Nov 2017 1134kwhs - reduction 19.4%   
• We have compared different insulators of heat - which was part of one to the SEAI workshops.
• We have completed an appliance audit.
• We have completed a 'Low Energy Day' with full school participation - no computers, lights, kettles, projectors, photocopiers were used basically everything electrical that could be turned off was turned off.  We only used  4kwhs that day which was  26kwhs less than the previous day.
• The on-going 'WOW' (Walk on Wednesday) initiative has proved very successful. Prior to starting 89% of families in the school travelled by car. Our first WOW - 52% of the families travelled to the school by car. Our fourth WOW - 23% of families travelled to school by car.  Reduction of 29% from day 1 to day 4 - truly amazing.
• Students have identified the effect of climate change during the SEAI workshops.
• Students have written energy saving commitments all up on notice board .
• 5th & 6th class students have identified the effects of climate change.