Debating
Well done to our Senior Debating Team of: Jonathan Hozier-Byrne, Lyndsey McGinn and Rebecca Winkworth on their victory over Loreto Convent Bray on Thursday November 10th in the Wicklow County Council Schools Environmental Debating Competition 2005/6.

Many thanks to Ms. Cathy McKean for organising and facilitating all our debates.

Leinster Under 19 Rugby
Well done to Burschi Wojnar on his selection and performance on the Leinster Under 19 Rugby team. Burschi capped two outstanding individual performances as Leinster proceeded to win the Schools Interprovincial title.

Mullingar Interschool Showjumping - Sunday November 27th
Congratulations to Kim Mulcahy, Lucy Murphy, Miriam Bourke and Emily Murphy who finished in 3rd place out of 48 teams.

The second team consisting of David Bourke, Julie Collins, Hugo Sherry and Alice Murphy finished in the top 15 teams while the third team of Fiona Kelly, Hayley Mulcahy, Alicia Devlin-Byrne also competed very well.

Well done to all.

Music Festival - Sunday November 27th
The St. Gerard’s Music Festival took place in the fabulous new centre for performing arts in the Junior School last evening. It was a great first performance for our new Hall and you, the performers, set a high bench mark for others to follow.

Many congratulations to all of the winners in the various categories, but more importantly, well done to everybody who participated. The quality of your performances was outstanding. Many thanks also to all the other students who came forward for audition and who were unsuccessful.

The school is indebted to Mr. Phil Coulter, Ms. Deirdre Farrell and Mr. Cyrille Laurens for adjudicating, and in particular to Ms. Ciara O’Connell, Ms. Diane Owens and Ms. Paul Claffey for the tireless work behind the scenes in organising this great musical success.

Thank you.

Christmas Child Charity Shoe Box Appeal
Well done to Maedhbh Delahunt and Jane McEvoy of 2nd Year, for their work on the Shoe Box Appeal for the Christmas Child Charity. The fabulous response of 2nd Years in gathering fifty presents for this appeal is a great tribute to their charitable goodwill. The Shoe Box presents will be distributed to children in Ethiopia.

Well done to Maedhbh and Jane for their initiative and willingness to take on the project. The success of the project is a credit to all the 2nd Year students.

Senior Cup Team
Congratulations to the Senior Cup Team on reaching the semi finals of the Leinster Senior League. We look forward with great enthusiasm to December with the upcoming final stages of this competition. We have not won this competition in the past and I encourage all of the school to support the Senior Team in their endeavours to win this competition.

To the team itself, now is the time to realise your true potential. There will be no second chances.

Well done to date. We look forward to greater things.

Senior Grils Hockey Team
The Senior Girls Hockey team gave an outstanding performance last Wednesday against near rivals, Loreto Convent, Bray. The 2-0 score line did not reflect the reality on the pitch.

This is a performance that you must build upon. Learn the lessons and use the experience to motivate yourselves to greater performances.

Gach buíochas do Iníon Uí Mháirtín as ucht gach cúnamh agus treoir a tugadh dóibh.

Debating
Congratulations to Dearbhail O’Crowley, Laura Prendergast and Abigail Dennis for succeeding to make it through to the second round of the Denny Debates, having debated the motion “Violent Video Games”.

Well done.

Benedit Blunnie and Daniel Cooney were unlucky not to proceed to the next round of Denny Debates, having debated the motion “Sexual Education in Schools”

The following team of Lucie Shelly, Kenneth Ho, Etaoin Donovan and Sophie Pigot will participate in the Mental Health Debates starting next week. We wish them well.

Megan Fox also participated on December 1st in the Denny Debates.

We wish all the students well.

Concern Debates
On Monday 5th December the Debating team of Dearbhail O’Crowley, Brian Fitzpatrick (both of 4th Year), Connie O’Brien and David Quinn (5th of Year) participated and won Speakers of the Evening. The team gave an outstanding performance and were most unlucky not to progress to the next stage. We congratulate St. David’s of Greystones on their success.

This team will learn from their experience and will mature as Debaters over the next two years. I wish to thank Ms. Paul Claffey for her dedication to this team and Ms. Avril Herriott for her support on Monday evening.