Senior girls hockey tour to Scotland

Bright and early on Friday 24 October we set off on our hockey tour to Scotland via Belfast. The journey was a long one in awful weather conditions. However we finally arrived at our hotel where there were very welcome soup and sandwiches waiting for us. We began the next day with a trip to Edinburgh city where we saw all the sights and even managed to get in a bit of shopping. Unfortunately, due to the bad weather we were unable to go into Edinburgh castle. We played our first hockey match against Trinity, (a club side). This proved to be a very friendly and enjoyable match with some of our players joining the other team. High School won the match 5-2. After the match we had a quick dinner and returned to the centre of Edinburgh for a spooky late night ghost tour!!! This was a great idea given that we were on the Halloween mid term break. We were all suitably scared and got into the mood of the season.
The next morning we had another early start and set off to play our second hockey match, this time against Inverleith Hockey Club youth team. We all had fun and there was a better standard of hockey played at this match. We came out with a 4-1 win.
That afternoon brought us the highlight of our trip. We headed up to the Scottish highlands for a quadbiking trek! The weather was pretty grim but this suited the activity well and we found ourselves happy up to our knees in muck!!! I think we’ll all agree that Freya Breen deserved the title of ‘paddy last’ by getting left behind and that Chloe McHugh easily earning the craziest driver title!!! There were lots of shreiks and laughter accompanying this activity and we loved it.
We would like to thank Ms. S. Jones, Mr. A. Levis and our bus driver B. King for giving up their free time to accompany and arrange this tour for us. We would also like to acknowledge the kind sponsorship received from the Parent’s Association.
Aimee Jones O’Connor, Eva Nugent
 

The ‘Commitmentettes’

In the chaos of the run up to the opening night of The Commitments the three girls (Lara, Molly and myself) took time out of the organized pandemonium to meet with Karin Coleman who has been touring with the Commitments for 16 years and was a vocalist on ‘The Commitments’ soundtrack. Karin kindly agreed to help us with our harmonies and backing vocals. Karin seemed very impressed! She also really helped us improve our performance and gave us the confidence we needed. Halfway through our session we received a surprise visit from Dick Massey who played Billy Mooney, the drummer in the film ‘The Commitments’. He watched us perform, wished us luck in our play and after we got over being unexpectedly star struck he signed our scripts for us. We had an amazing time and we hope you will all come to see our hard work and efforts realized on the 20th, 21st and 22nd of November in our own interpretation of ‘The Commitments’. We would like to thank Ms. Bourke who organized everything, to Karin and Dick for their great kindness, also to Sebastian Adams for recording the session and Patrick King for accompanying us.
Stephanie Lodola
 

Habitat for Humanity

Next April 2009 a group of students from The High School will be going on the Habitat for Humanity trip to Ghana, to help build a home for a family during the Easter holidays. We are now appealing to students and parents who would be interested in sponsoring a brick in our virtual house to help towards the costs. All donations would be greatly appreciated. Rebecca Mills

Medical consent forms

The dates for the tetanus and diphtheria booster vaccinations for selected pupils in Form 2 are 18, 19, 20 November. Scoliosis screening for all girls in Forms 1, 2, 3 will take place on 8 December. Please return all consent forms to the Nurse as soon as possible.

Simon Fun Run

Congratulations to all who raised money for the Simon Community by taking part in the Fun Run. The total figure raised by the students for the run was €2052.20. This is a fantastic sum - well done to all involved.

UCD High Achiever awards

Congratulations to Daniel Alkin and Rowan Lacey who have received these awards based on their excellent Leaving Certificate results.

Parents' Association

The following committee was elected at the AGM 2008: Sue Barber, Alan Browning (President), Lorraine Brunell (Hon Secretary), Ken Farrell (Hon Treasurer), Eamon Flaherty, Bridget Hebblethwaite, Peter Manly, Eileen O’Driscoll, Ian Power, David Shaw, Dawn Sweetnam.
You can contact the association by telephoning (4922611) or e-mailing. Please note that the Association does not deal with specific individual matters, which should be brought to the attention of the school in the normal manner. Nor does it represent individual parents or pupils in their dealings with the school.

Fixtures and training this week

Boys hockey
U 13 St Andrew's Wed 19 Away 3.00
Girls basketball
U 16 St Columba's Tues 18 Away 3.15
U 19 Beaufort Tues 25 Away 3.15
U 16 Beaufort Tues 25 Away 4.15
Rugby
1st XV (L) Kilkenny Wed 19 Home 2.30
2nd XV Kilkenny Wed 19 Home 2.30
JCT (L) CBC Monkstown Wed 19 Away 2.30
U 14 A, B King's Hospital Wed 19 Home 2.30
1st XV, 2nd XV Royal Armagh Sat 22 Home 10.45
Golf
Senior boys Terenure Wed 19 Castle GC 8.30
Senior boys St Macdara's Fri 21 Castle GC 9.00tbc
Results - well done!
In girls basketball, the Under 16 beat Holy Child Sallynoggin 32-18, Mount Anville 39-28 and also beat St Andrew's 28-22. The Under 19 beat Holy Child Sallynoggin 28-11, Mount Anville 42-21 and also beat St Andrew's 33-21. In golf, the senior boys team beat Templeogue College in a recent schools matchplay league, P. Butler and O. Carroll 6 up, P. O'Kelly and J. Walsh 4 up. Congratulations to Shane O'Donoghue and Josh Purcell, both playing for Leinster Under 18 in the interprovincials.