We have good news at last! The initial grant of planning for our new school building has issued which is wonderful news. Our school in one of seven schools in Counties Wicklow and Westmeath that forms the "Dargle Bundle". We are the third school in the group to get planning. We await the receipt of the full planning grant following a four week wait period. There may be some conditions added however, these appear to be fairly standard and are not a cause of concern.

I would like to acknowledge the commitment and professionalism of the National Development Finance Agency (NDFA) and the design team. I wish to thank Wicklow County Council, our local councillors and elected representatives, KWETB, our Board of Management, our Parents’ Association and our local community, for the ongoing support and for making this a reality. None of this would happen without the oversight and commitment of the Department of Education. The need for a new school in our area has been recognised by the Department and all involved for sometime. We look forward, with anticipation, to what will be a state of the art new school which will serve the needs of our current and future generations of learners.

Our Leaving Certificate students enjoyed a well earned break from their studies on Thursday. They travelled to Dundrum Town Centre and had a fun ice skating session. Afterwards there was time for lunch and some retail therapy, while enjoying good company and the festive atmosphere. We wish our sixth years all the best over the coming months, they are an extremely pleasant and positive group of young adults. Thanks to their Class Teachers Ms.Dermody, Ms.Callanan, Mr.Lambert, Ms.Healy, Mr.Horan and their Year Head Ms.Donoghue.

There was an impressive display of student enterprise at the annual Transition Year and Leaving Cert Applied Market day yesterday.

Well Done to our 5 Laurel and 6 Laurel groups who completed the 1st Annual LCA Maths Quiz on Thursday morning, 7th December.

There were seven teams who battled it out over a variety of maths problems across a two classes.

With very little between the teams the eventual winners were as follows;

1st Place: Richard Byrne, Ryan Byrne & Martin Tobin

2nd Place: Anthony Hughes, Adam Donegan & Michael Lennon

3rd Place: Dylan Collins & Michael Donohoe

A big thanks to our 2nd year helpers and to Ms. Byrne and Ms. Lennon for organising this great event. 

There was an impressive display of student innovation and enterprise at the annual transition year and leaving cert. applied market day yesterday. Our neighbouring National schools as well as our first and second year students visited the many stands and presentations. Well done to all involved. 

The Colaiste Bhride 3rd year boys football team opened their Wicklow Junior A campaign with a two point defeat away to St Kevin’s Dunlavin on Wednesday December 6th. In the opening half the Carnew side played against the wind and found it hard to break forward. In fact it was the home team who looked far more hungry and they started with great intent opening up a mine point lead in the first quarter as we conceded three quick goals in succession. Although the Carnew lads settled into the game they struggled to finish off with scores when they broke forward. Dunlavin finished the half strongly and some well taken points gave them a 13 point lead at half time lead, 3-6 to 0-2. 

On Friday, all TY students took part in Think Languages 2023 which is a national celebration of languages and culture. Students stayed with their base classes for the day and took part in a number of workshops from Origami to Kung-Fu. The students also took part in a national Kahoot quiz and one of our teams came out on top. The winning team was Ben Neville, Calum Gregan and Patrick Browne and they won a €40 book voucher. The Kung-Fu class was a big hit with students. It was a very high energy class with students also learning some basic Korean words as part of the workshop.

Well done to our students for their enthusiastic participation and we hope you enjoyed the day as much as your teachers did.

The home economics department have organised a school-wide BAKING COMPETITION. Please see the attached image for details. 

Our school concert band arrived in France on Thursday, 30th November. They have had a busy few days practising for the performance in Le Rex Theatre Chateau Gontier. This is a huge occasion for our young musicians. They will play both on their own and jointly with the French Concert Band. We wish them all the very best this evening.