Maryfield College

Congratulations -Maryfield College students receive awards in Recognition of High Achievement in the Leaving Certificate Examination

Nina Milosavljevic was presented with the JP Mc Manus All Ireland Scholarship Award 2014 on November 8th by the Minister for Education & Skills Ms Jan O Sullivan & Mr JP Mc Manus .

Nina also receive An Entrance Scholarship Award from Trinity College on November 19th 2014  alongside Kate Lawless and Caroline Murphy.

Anam Shah received a UCD Entrance Scholarship Award on November 12th 2014 and Maria Dunne received an Entrance Scholarship Award from St Patricks College Drumcondra on November 25th2014.


Science News

Well done to our twenty senior cycle students who participated in a two day Computer Programming workshop during the October Break. The Computer Programming workshop was hosted by Trinity College Dublin in association with Student2Scientist.The students were also shown around the Physics Dept. of TCD and met with postgraduate students.

Science-news

 


Science Week 2014

To celebrate Science Week 2014 the Science Department published a science question each day for the students to answer.  All of the answers were placed in an answer box in the school and each day one correct answer was randomly selected. The winners received prizes the following week.

 


Tomi Reichental Visits Maryfield

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On 14th October 2014 Transition Year and Leaving Certificate History students were given the opportunity to listen to Tomi Reichental, a survivor of the World War II Nazi Bergen-Belsen concentration camp, speak about his horrific experience. By now there are very few survivors of Nazi brutality and we were therefore honoured to have Mr. Reichental visit our school.

Tomi described his childhood before the war in Slovakia, how Nazi anti-Semitic laws affected him and recalled being bullied for being a Jew. He remembered wearing a yellow star and explained how his family were arrested. Students and teachers sat in complete silence as he spoke. It was difficult to listen to his reminiscences as he recalled the appalling conditions which he experienced for seven days in a carriage with no windows or toilets during a freezing November in 1944 while travelling to the camp. He was only nine years old and alas this was only a sample of the nightmare ahead. He explained to students how the Jewish population in Slovakia dropped from approximately 90,000 to 25,000 as Nazis murdered his people in concentration camps across Germany.

In Bergen-Belsen he actually played among corpses. He also remembers watching his grandmother’s corpse being thrown on a pile of rotting bodies like an old rag doll. He lost thirty five members of his family. Luckily Tomi survived until the liberation in 1945. He recalled that despite the absence of guards the inmates were too afraid to leave. Eventually the Allies arrived and provided them with food. But this was a bad idea as their stomachs had shrunk and many people continued to die as they could not digest it.

He eventually returned to his home town in Slovakia. Despite the fact that the war was over, attitudes towards Jews had not changed. As a teenager he emigrated to Israel, later moving to Germany to become an engineer. In the late 1950s he eventually moved to Ireland and married an Irish girl and had three children.

It took fifty years before Tomi could speak about what happened to him. He now travels all around Ireland as well as different countries to speak about his experience during the Holocaust. He has written a book ‘I was a Boy in Belsen’. Students were able to buy signed copies at the end of his talk.

We would sincerely like to thank Tomi Reichental for taking the time out of his very busy schedule to come to Maryfield College and share his experience with us. We would also like to thank Nora Moore, Aoife Moore’s mother, and Rosemary from the Holocaust Education Trust Ireland, www.hetireland.org who helped organise Tomi’s visit to the school.

By Chloe Walker and Clare Brown (with the assistance of Ms.Townshend)

 


Sports Update

Basketball

Our basketball teams are having a relatively good year so far. Each of our older groups (i.e. our under 16A and B and under 19A and B) has won at least one match each and two of them are currently unbeaten. The under 16A team has comfortably beaten Drogheda, Glasnevin and St. Raphaela’s while the under 19B sent Drogheda and Baldoyle home empty handed. Meanwhile, the under 16B team has won one and narrowly lost their other two (one was only by one point).

The under 19A team has proven to be our most improved team and their season started auspiciously with a 24 point victory against St. Mary’s, Baldoyle. Dominican College was up next and an extremely tight match ended up going into extra time. Our girls were two points up with a few seconds to go when a Dominican player scored a basket from just inside the three point line, i.e. a two pointer. That should have tied the match up for double extra time but disastrously the referee interpreted the shot as being worth three points so our neighbours ended up triumphing by a solitary point. The very next game they faced Manor House and lost by a basket in the last minute. It has been hitherto cruel for this team but they still have three more matches to make things right.

The First and Second Year A and B teams are due to start their respective seasons in the next few weeks with plenty of promise having been shown in training.

Camogie

Our under 16A team has hit the ground running with emphatic victories against Loreto, Beaufort and St. Wolstan’s, Celbridge. The third match was a disappointing draw against Portmarnock C.S. after leading them by 12 points at one stage. The girls will play a quarter final soon in their quest for glory.

Our under 19 team is having a contrasting experience. Replacing the eleven All Ireland finalists lost to the Leaving Cert. was always going to be a tall order and so it has proven so far. The season opened with a decent performance to earn a draw against a formidable Our Lady’s, Terenure. Sadly, that has been the highlight up until now as two consecutive reverses against Dominican College and St. MacDara’s C.S. have served to disappoint. All is not lost however; the girls are now in the semi final of the shield which will allow them a chance to continue their sojourn.


Central Remedial Clinic Playground Opening

The C.R.C. held the official opening of their playground, on Tuesday the 13th of October.

Two of this year’s Prefects , Martha Farrell and Ciara Drumgoole, attended the opening ceremony with Ms. Farrelly. The invitation to this event was extended to our school, because of a fundraiser which the Prefects of 2012 undertook to raise funds for the playground.

Minister of state, Kathleen Lynch, cut the ribbon and thanked all those present for their kind donations.


Maryfield College Students participating in the Soroptimist International Dublin Club Public Speaking Event in the Mansion House on Saturday November 15th 2014.

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Maryfield Students “Speaking Out”

Seven schools, including Maryfield College, recently participated in the Soroptimist International Girls’ Public Speaking Competition. Representing Maryfield were Alice Clarke (5L), Nadia Corrigan (TY) and Libby Sedgwick (TY). Speaking in the historic setting of the Oak Room at Dublin’s Mansion House, the Maryfield girls delivered well-structured speeches on Education and Human Rights with passion, poise and sophistication. Alice, Nadia and Libby were awarded certificates for their engaging presentations.