Gaisce
There are currently 36 Gaisce Bronze Medal participants in fourth year. Their award has been running for a few months now and participants are continuing to fulfill all their sections over the summer holidays as we aiming to have the majority finished by September.
The 38 Bronze medallists and 1 Silver medallist in our school recently finished their awards. Their award ceremony took place on 21st April here in the school.
About Gaisce
The President's Award - Gaisce is the National challenge Award for young people in Ireland. Her Excellency President Mary Mc Aleese is patron of the Award program.
Who is it for?
The Award is open to anyone between the ages of 15-25 years of age
How many Awards are there?
There are three Awards:
|
Level |
Minimum age |
Completion Time |
|
Bronze |
15 |
6-9 months |
|
Silver |
16 |
12-15 months |
|
Gold |
17 |
18-24 months |
What exactly do I do to earn an award?
There are four different areas of activity in the award programme and you must participate in each section. The four sections are:
Physical Recreation- 1 hour a week for 12 weeksThe participants of Carrick-on-Shannon Community School have taken on a range of physical challenges for this section including walking, running, cycling, golf, table tennis, football, basketball, athletics and many more.
Personal Skill- 1 hour a week for 26 weeks
A range of personal skills are being undertaken such as learning to play a musical instrument, advanced computer courses, website development, first aid courses, art and welding.
Community Involvement- 1 hour a week for 16 weeks
The community section of the award has activities such as the school tuck shop and helping the elderly. Mentoring is a very popular choice among students. This is were they volunteer to act as mentors to help ease the transition of 1st year students from national school to secondary school.
Venture Section
Previous expeditions include climbing Croagh Patrick and overnight camping in Lough Keel scout camp together with walking from Keadue back to the scout camp. This year’s group will be attending
Lough Allen Adventure Centre in Co. Leitrim.
Recently, the Gaisce participants of our school satisfied the venture element of the Gaisce award by partaking in a canoeing venture for a weekend at the Lough Allen Adventure Centre, Co. Leitrim. Because of the large number of participants, we were seperated into two groups and took part in the venture section over two weekends. On Friday morning we met at the school where we continued our journey to the adventure centre by bus. After meeting the instructors we started our training day, where we learned how to build fires, construct tents, make food adequately in the wild and the necessary navigational skills needed to reach our remote destination. That night we camped beside the centre as a practice run for what was to come when we went to the island. The next day, we set off on the long trip down Lough Allen to reach the island where we would be staying. We set up camp, collected firewood and built our fire for the night. After a long but enjoyable night around the fire, we packed up and returned to the adventure center ready to go home. Overall it was very enjoyable and a great experience.