Mairead McGuinness visits our school

Mairead McGuinness is a Member of the European Parliament (MEP), and also Vice President of that Parliament.  The boys from Ms Carragher's Fifth Class and Mr Arthur's Sixth Class were delighted to welcome her to our school during the week.

Mairead has a special interest in education, particularly, of course in relation to the European Union and she came to support our project for the Blue Star Programme. This programme encourages our students to build their knowledge of Europe's culture, history and politics. 

Mairead got to see the work of every class in a slide show presentation of the school's work. Then, the boys in fifth and sixth presented their own projects in person to Mairead. 

An MEP since 2004, Mairead spoke a little about her background in agriculture and media. She also spoke about the difficulties of life as a politician commuting from Dublin to Brussels each week but of the importance work of the EU. Getting representatives from twenty seven nations to agree with one another was often difficult but ultimately has brought a lot of improvements and, vitally, has encouraged peace among nations.

Laytown lady, Emir Smith-Duff also accompanied Ms McGuinness and was equally delighted to chat with the boys and their teachers and answer their questions. She pointed out that the twelve stars on the EU flag symbolized the EU ideals of unity, solidarity and harmony.   

With a plane to catch and meetings to attend, Mairead was whisked away to Dublin Airport but left us all inspired to learn more about the vital work of our European politicians and its parliament.