CLONMEL’S Gaelcholáiste Chéitinn recently completed its 15th year of providing quality second-level co-education through the medium of Irish to Clonmel and its environs.
From a class of 14 students in 2004 to its current enrolment of over 150, the school has grown steadily in the intervening 15 years.
One of the aims of Gaelcholáiste Chéitinn is to foster an interest and love for our native language and culture. This is done daily throughout the school, allowing students to become immersed in our language. This has proven so beneficial to students coming to Gaelcholáiste Chéitinn from both Gaelscoileanna and English-speaking primary schools. It supports students coming from English-speaking primary schools by providing a 15-week Irish language course.
The school offers a wide variety of subjects and places a strong emphasis on the humanities and STEM subjects. Gaelcholáiste Chéitinn prides itself on its dedicated engineering room, which has facilitated many students to pursue engineering as a career. In conjunction with Boston Scientific, the school annually presents the STEM Student of the Year Award to a sixth year student progressing to third level education in a STEM related discipline.
Gaelcholáiste Chéitinn has a tradition of achieving outstanding Leaving Certificate results, 2019 being no exception. 5% of the students attained over 600 points, the national average is 1.3%. 16% exceeded 500 points, the national average is 13.2%, while 69% of the students obtained over 400 points, once again bettering the national average of 37.2%.
Gaelcholáiste Chéitinn has a proud record of students winning scholarships to many of Ireland’s top third level institutions. These include the Ernest Walton Scholarship to UL for physics and the Janssen Engineering Scholarship in CIT. There were further engineering scholarships awarded for UL and CIT, the Science Entrance Scholarship in UCD, and this year the Entrance Exhibition Award in Trinity College Dublin.
Past students have completed or are completing studies in disciplines including international business, law, pharmacy, languages, teacher education training, music, dentistry, financial maths, nursing, computer software design, biomedical science, art and animation, and architecture.
“While we place a very strong emphasis on academic achievement, we place an equal importance on the development of our students through extra-curricular activities. Our students’ successes in these extra-curricular activities match their academic successes and Gaelcholáiste Chéitinn takes great pride in celebrating our students’ triumphs,” Gaelcholáiste Chéitinn spokesperson says.
“Since the school’s inception, we have been competing in the Gael Linn organised Comórtas Uí Chadhain Debating Competition. In recent weeks, both our senior and junior teams have won their way into the upcoming second round.”
Students of Gaelcholáiste Chéitinn scooped four of the seven places available in the regional final of the prestigious Poetry Aloud Competition to progress to the All-Ireland semi-final, which takes place shortly in the National Library in Dublin.
Transition year students in a team-building workshop completed the intricate construction of a K’Nex bridge in the record time of 34 minutes, making them joint-first place leaders across second-level schools in Ireland.
“For a small school we are punching well above our weight in sport across football for both girls and boys, hurling, rugby and basketball. To date this year, our boys’ football team have progressed to round two of their campaign. Our under 16 and under 19 boys’ basketball teams have both reached the All-Ireland Cup semi-final and are both in the Regional League semi-finals.”
Plans are afoot to go on a Gaelcholáiste Chéitinn school trip this year to Paris. Previous destinations have included Barcelona, Northern Italy, Berlin and numerous trips to Champions League matches in England.
“Our music department in the midst of preparing to stage our first school musical at the end of this month. Students will perform Ár gCeolseó Scoile on November 27. Tickets, which are selling fast, are available from the school office and can be booked on 052-6126269.
“On November 14, the school is hosting a pop-up Gaeltacht from 7.30pm. We invite students, parents and all with a grá for Gaeilge to come along and join us for a cupán tae and a chat as Gaeilge.”
