Killorglin students win national science awards

STUDENTS Timothy McGrath and Jack Nagle from Killorglin Community College made it a hugely successful year for the school when scooping prizes at the national SciFest STEM Awards, held at the Marino Institute of Education in Dublin.

In a competitive field of 27 projects representing schools from all over Ireland, including 7 projects from Boston Scientific, Timothy and Jack kept the flag flying for Killorglin Community College which is the only Kerry school to qualify again this year for a third year in succession. And if that wasn’t reason enough to celebrate, Killorglin Community College was the only school at last Friday’s competition to have two projects qualify for the finals.

Timothy is a Transition Year student and his project is called ‘Ultra Vision’ which uses coding and new technology integrated into glasses enabling visually impaired people identify and navigate safely around obstacles. Timothy qualified as a result of his win at Kerry SciFest for the Boston Scientific and received the ‘Excellence in STEM’ Award.

Jack is a 3rd year student who also qualified via his win at Kerry SciFest with his project ‘Tractor Safe Lock’ - a safety device designed to reduce farm deaths by minimising tractor rolling. Jack was awarded the ‘SciFest 10th Anniversary Award’.

“This has been a rollercoaster year for the school and its students with many of our projects in various competitions qualifying for national finals,” said Donal O Reilly, Deputy Principal of Killorglin Community College.

“We have a strong focus on STEM in the school and have a unique approach to teaching and learning. We are committed to preparing our students for the careers of tomorrow. This is our third year in succession winning the Kerry SciFest Award which really reinforces what we are doing at Killorglin Community College,” Mr O’Reilly added.

Meanwhile, SciFest is an all-island initiative fostering active, collaborative and inquiry-based learning among second level students. A record 10,000 students exhibited their projects in 2017

LEFT: Timothy McGrath received an ‘Excellence in STEM’ Award on Friday at the SciFest National final for his project ‘Ultra Vision’ which uses coding and new technology integrated into glasses to enable visually impaired people to identify and navigate...