We are delighted to announce North Monastery Secondary School has been awarded its third Green Flag – for water awareness. Over the past two years, members of our Green School Committee were busy working on various projects to help raise water awareness within our school community and the wider community.
Some of the projects involved students becoming water ambassadors, visiting the water treatment plant on Lee Road, and at Inniscarra. A beach clean-up to raise awareness of the importance of coastal communities. Students monitored water use within our school and at home and presented their findings at our special Water Awareness Days in Spring 2018 and Winter 2019.
We hope to celebrate this achievement when we return to school in the autumn.
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We would like to take this opportunity to thank Ms. Coleman who continues to play a huge role in leading the Green Flag and the committee. We would also like to thank Lee Quilligan (6th Year – Chairperson) and Adam O’Mahony (6th Year – Secretary) both who led our students and helped to shape Green flag initiatives.
We are also sad to say goodbye to 6th Year students Ryan O’Sullivan, Luke O’ Connor Hogan, and Owen Roache who have been part of the Green Flag committee from the very beginning. Also thank you to our 2nd-year students Eoin Mc Philbin, Cian Boland, Tyrek Odebiyi, Presley Osagie-Ali, Evan Lucey, Sean O’ Lynch, Diarmuid Lyons, and Piotr Pawlowski and staff members Mr. Barry, Mr. Coughlan, Ms. Sherran, Ms. Barry, and Mr. Healy.
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To mark the occasion Presely Osagie-Ali (currently in 2nd year) wrote this very special piece to capture what it is like to be part of the committee.
Signing up for my school’s Green Schools committee, I didn’t really know what to expect. I thought it would be something no one took very seriously, something that only the small percentage of students would care about. Almost two years on the committee, it’s been fun. Under the guidance of Ms. Coleman, we started out with a committee consisting of 1st years, 2nd years, and 5th years. At this time, we were aiming to get our third Green Flag for the Water Theme. At first, it was easy tasks such as monitoring the work of the other two flags (Litter and Waste and Energy). Eventually, we had to do more things like an environmental review of water usage in our school, visiting places like the Lifetime Lab Waterworks, cleaning up beaches, and even doing a presentation in front of the whole school on water pollution and conservation. We also worked on our flag in other ways, such as river clean-ups, celebrating World Water Day, visiting water treatment plants, senior students planning for a school water fountain to cut down on plastic bottles. Also, a few students, along with me, applied to be part of the Water Ambassador Program.
Since September 2019 we have been working harder than ever. We even improved the committee itself in ways such as having a student chairperson who leads the meetings, and a secretary who takes meeting minutes. The committee meets every Monday at lunchtime. Every week there is a different focus as there is a famous ‘7 steps’ process if any school is to be awarded a Green Flag. After a few months of hard work, our committee finally applied for our Water Flag. I am proud to say that North Monastery Secondary School has been awarded the Green Flag in Water!
Written by Presley Osagie-Alli (2nd Year)