Fifth Year student Jack Wall O’Reilly had all his hair shaved off in the Atrium during the morning break on Thursday the 9th of March in aid of the Glenstal Kenya School Project. Students were more than willing to carry out the deed!
Jack, who will be travelling to Kenya in the Summer with Fr John and other Fifth Years, manged to raise over €500 in the run up to the event!
Background to the Kenya School Project
Fr. John O Callaghan, OSB
The students of Glenstal Abbey School are committed to promoting the education of young people in Kenya. They have a targeted approach and work with a different school each year. This includes the provision of laptop computers, renovation of classrooms (provide cement floors, painted walls and lots of posters), toilets and a water supply. These cost money and our first effort is to fundraise up to €20,000 (minimum) per year. We use any means at our disposal! Cake sales, asking friends / companies for a donation, internet auctions, Carol services at Christmas, trinket sales at sporting fixtures, bike races, parents passing a hat around at work, anything! Every cent goes to meeting our predetermined targets in Kenya; none is spent on our own expenses. Please feel free to participate! Now is your chance, where every cent helps.
In July the ‘Kenya Crew’ from Fifth Years will visit the identified school, Olkiramatian Secondary school. Members include Jack Wall O’Reilly, Arthur Moore, Ben O’Sullivan, Aran Egan, James Fitzpatrick and George Downing. We will live in a nearby wild game conservancy area. We have safe but close contact with the animal world! Our days will be spent with our African peers, sharing computer skills (they love them) and teaching conversational English (they speak Swahili and a little English). We play some sports with them too. We like to think we contribute but in fact we learn how lucky we are!
Not everyone has a tap with instant water, a varied diet, transport to school or considers that they have a future to look forward to!
Almost all members of the team had a role to play during the busy break time. Special thanks to both Claire and Lorna at Bank Of Ireland, Mairead O’Sullivan for bringing the programme to us, and Fr. William for allowing the opening to flow as easily as it did.
On Tuesday the 7th February Transition Year students set off on our trip to cycle the Waterford Greenway. We were excited to get off in Waterford after the bus journey down. Although it was quite a long journey to Waterford, it didn’t drag down our hopes for the cycle as any day out of school beats going to classes! I was a bit surprised when I hopped off the bus because we were in the middle of a town – not the type of atmosphere I expected for a greenway cycle but I put aside my doubts and we all collected our bikes in a shop up the street. When we all were geared up and ready to go, three instructors led us out of the town down a cycling path between the houses. That’s when my hopes for the trip were truly fulfilled. It was like we snuck out the back door of the dull town into the vibrant countryside. The greenway path avoided most roads so we weren’t cycling in single file up a main road. The path also captured the landscape of Waterford with dug in valleys that were covered with a canopy of green leaves on the outstretched branches of the brown oak and vast fields that went on as if they had no end, with cattle scattered among some of them. The cycle itself never seemed difficult, even after 10 kilometres, most of us weren’t even thirsty, but one of the milestone breaks was at a small shop just off the greenway. It was called ‘Siopa Beag’, which we all thought suited it quite well in fact.
We eventually emerged, soaked, but our minds were quickly elsewhere as we were met by towering walls of mud and rock at each side with curling roots reaching out from the sides. It was like a huge man made valley carved through the ground and paved with a smooth tar road. The finish line came eventually and we all pulled into a large courtyard with huge stone buildings at all sides.
