Aoibheann and Padraic are joint winners of the Young Person of the Year Award 2015

Posted in Connect on December 7, 2015.

Aoibheann Mangan (8) and Padraic Godwin (9), students of Cloghans Hill NS which is located on the Galway/Mayo Border were named joint winners of the Young Person of the Year Award at this year’s 2015 People of the Year Awards which took place at the Radisson Blu St Helen’s Hotel in Dublin and was broadcast live on RTÉ One, Saturday, December 5^th. Cloghans is a small school in the parish of Carras with just 14 pupils .

Aoibheann and Padraic won the award for creating and designing a farm safety website for children – http://www.farmsafety4kids.net/

They felt that children needed farm safety messages that were aimed directly at them, not at adults. The fatality rate in agriculture is far higher than any other economic sector. Of the 193 people killed on Irish farms between 2005 and 2014, 22 were children. According to their website “we are trying to get every child to look at our website, to examine how it can help them identify dangers on the farm, dangers to them and dangers to others – their parents, relatives, neighbours and friends and encourage them to be safer.”

They made sure the website had child-friendly information on animals, tractor and water safety, with a range of videos and games. From that they emailed, tweeted and blogged about the site, leading it to appear on the news on RTÉ, UTV and TG4.

It all began last winter for the young students as part of the Hour of Code which saw them sit down and think about how to put their new-found skills into action to create a farm safety website. They created the website in school in March and April 2015. The timing of the award is perfect with the Hour of Code week starting today, Aoibheann and Padraic are shining examples of high achievement.

They launched it at the end of March and have since won an Eircom Junior Spider Award, a Young Person of the Year in Mayo Special Award, the Boots Maternity and Infant Awards Young Achiever of the Year award and they have been invited to show case their work at the Mayo Ploughing Championships, the Connacht Spring show and the National Ploughing Championships.

The website is an invaluable source of information and whilst it is aimed at children the wide range of comprehensive safety advice is of use to everyone. Be sure to check out their website for important info on how to stay safe on the farm http://www.farmsafety4kids.net/