St Joseph’s robotics team receive hero’s welcome in Ballinrobe

ON a week when one Mayo team came up short on the big stage, another flew the flag for their school, town, county, province and country on a global stage with honour and distinction.

St Joseph’s Primary School, Ballinrobe, rejoiced after becoming the first ever team from Connacht to be honoured at the global VEX Robotics World Championship last week. 

The school scooped an ‘Innovate’ award at the major international competition for demonstrating ‘an effective and well documented Engineering Design Process for a specific aspect of their team’s design of gameplay strategy’.

A group of ten students travelled from South Mayo to Dallas with their principal, Dymphna Culhane, teachers Sean Flannelly and Edel Roache, as the first Connacht team ever to represent Ireland at the competition.

This historic win comes on the back of an All-Ireland title they delivered through a robot which was tasked with picking up and dispatching as many square cubes as possible in a minute.

St Joseph’s were the sole Irish representatives at this year’s competition and have received huge support from the local community.

The school, which teaches coding from a young age, have made waves on the regional, national and now the international robotics scene since they first began entering competitive teams a number of years ago.

Speaking to The Mayo News yesterday (Monday), St Joseph’s Primary School Principal Dymphna Culhane, described the experience in Dallas as ‘absolutely phenomenal’.

“We were all so emotional and everybody was so delighted for us. We were the only ones there from Ireland and some people would have known where Ireland was and then others would have great kind of fondness for Ireland,” Ms Culhane said.

On Sunday afternoon, Ballinrobe came to a halt as the proud students received a garda escort to St Joseph’s, where friends, family, fellow students and members of the community bestowed on them a hero’s homecoming.

Ms Culhane described the gathering that greeted them in sunny South Mayo as ‘the most amazing welcome’.

“We’re so thankful to all the people of Ballinrobe for making such an effort to come out and welcome us.

“Everyone was just so happy for us and for the and all the staff were there to welcome us. There was such a feeling at the front of the school. Everyone was so happy for us and for the school,” she said.

“I know the staff were there, it was a Sunday Bank Holiday weekend, for everyone to turn up was absolutely phenomenal.

“I think the children really represented our school and our county and our country,” added Ms Culhane.

“They really couldn’t have done it any better. They were just a credit to themselves and anyone that has had anything to do with them.”