Small school with a big heart
It has always been one of the smallest schools in the region, and that’s both a part of its charm as well as making sure that its recent 50th anniversary celebrations was a very families affair.
The official day of celebration for St Joseph’s NS in Halverstown kicked off last Saturday at midday, when two newly-built classrooms were blessed and officially opened. Then there was mass in a marquee on the school grounds.
A Family Fun afternoon included refreshments from 2pm, and throughout the day present and past pupils and even people from Kilcullen who never had any direct connection with the school could examine old roll books and photographs, and were entertained by live music in the marquee and singing from the pupils, as well as fun stuff from the Tricky Tricksters. Up to 200 items were made available for the exhibition and even included some Report Cards for individual students.
A booklet was available on the day with some of the pictures and with stories written by some past pupils about their time in the school, as well as from teachers.
The evening before, many of those present enjoyed a pre-celebration dinner dance in Fallons, where music was provided by Thin Ice.
The school currently has 28 pupils and on the day it began it had 11. Since that first day, more than 360 pupils have sat through their years of primary education in St Joseph’s.
“We’re small, but we have always managed to keep going, and our projected enrolments now that we have two new classrooms are bigger,” says current Principal Marion Sherlock. “That’s partly because of the new families who have come to live in the area, and they tend to be young families with a number of siblings coming up to school age.”
The school’s hinterland extends into Kilcullen, Dunlavin and Crookstown, but because of its size there are a number of families who have been associated with the school through several generations.
“The size of the school makes it a very family-oriented place,” says Marion Sherlock. “The older ones look after the younger ones, and everybody knows everybody else. And you can get the children involved in projects that you couldn’t do in larger classes, do the things that you learn in training college.”
On that last, the children last year did a project on the glaciation of the Curragh and brought it to exhibit at the Young Scientists Exhibition.
“Professor John Feehan came down from UCD to talk to them, and parents got involved, doing things that you could only do in a small environment.”
It also seems to be a fact that children with special needs of any kind tend to thrive in a small school environment, and often lose their problems. “We just have the time that other schools don’t,” suggests Marion. “The children learn to look after each other, and to accept difference. When we have in one room children from eight to 13 years, they accept difference very quickly.”
Over the 50 years there have been four Principals: Peggy Keville, Mary O’Mahoney, Esther Reddy and Marion Sherlock. Overall there have been about 160 families involved, many of them second and third generations.
