Anton McNulty
“It is like moving into a new school,” was the reaction of Sabina Munnelly, the Principal of St Brendan’s School in Belmullet following its €7 million redevelopment.
Yesterday, the Minister for Education and Skills, Mary Coughlan officially opened the new redevelopment of St Brendan’s College which includes new rooms for Woodwork, Construction Studies, Art, a new library, a Language Laboratory, Construction Design room, two new Science Labs, a Computer room, a new Technical Graphics room and a new staff room. The development also includes a new purpose built PE Hall.
In May 2008, the former Minister for Education, Mary Hannifin turned the sod on the development and two years later, her successor Mary Cloughan opened the state-of-the-art building. The Minister was given a guard of honour by the pupils and the building was also blessed by the Bishop of Killala, Dr Fleming.
The Principal, Sabina Munnelly, told The Mayo News that they are thrilled with the new development which she said provides for a better atmosphere for learning. She also admitted that the school was fortunate to receive the funding before the cutbacks in capital grants.
“This was a very big undertaking by the school but we are thrilled with the outcome. There is a lot more space now and that makes a big difference when your teaching. The teachers have their own classroom and there was also a big investment made in new technology. The rooms are bigger and brighter and we can cater for any subject on the curriculum. It is like moving into a new school and the students and the teachers really appreciate that,” she said.
Construction on the school began in the summer of 2008 and while the staff and pupils continued on in the school, the Leaving and Junior Cert exams were sat in the Broadhaven Bay Hotel.
St Brendan’s has a long tradition of involvement in sport but because of the inclement weather conditions along the Erris coast, it was impossible to have PE as a full time subject. Mrs Munnelly describes the new PE Hall as the ‘jewel in the crown’ of the school which includes two gyms equipped with a weight room and cardio-vascular machines such as treadmills and bikes.
“We are making great use of the PE Hall and the PE teacher, Neil Reilly, puts in a lot of work into it. There is a lot of equipment which the pupils would not be familiar with but there is always something happenning whether it is during or after school. Before this we weren’t able to have a proper PE programme because of the weather,” she concluded.
