OPERATION SMILE BAKE SALE
During the summer before TY, I traveled to Rome for an International Student leadership conference (ISLC) held each year. I was blown away. I listened to Operation Smile volunteers, donors and even people Op Smile had treated. I, along with 600 students from around the world, was completely fascinated. Right then I made a promise to myself that I would do what I could to help this amazing work. As soon as I returned from the conference I got on the phone to my auntie. She was delighted that I was so inspired and gave me A few ideas on how to fundraise for this cause. Then, while the idea was still fresh in my head, I emailed the vice-principle Mr Drummy to tell him about the experience. I told him how I wanted to organise a fundraiser during my fourth year. I kept in regular contact with him over the year, until eventually I organised a meeting with Mr Geraghty to pitch this fundraiser. I prepared for weeks in advance to fully decide the best way to ask permission for the fundraiser. The meeting went well, and I got the go ahead for a bake sale and draw on Friday the 27th of April. The next think I needed to do was organise the bake sale itself. I traveled into the Operation Smile Dublin office and got T-shirts, collection buckets and posters to help promote the bake sale. Then the week before the bake sale I told my year head, Mrs Ní Mhártín about what I was doing. She was really helpful and reminded me of loads of things I had to check. I talked to Brian from the kitchen and he said I could use the dining hall during small break of Friday. On the Wednesday before the bake sale I gave a speech to the TY group. I spoke about what Op Smile is and about my own involvement. I then walked around the school with some helpers and asked for volunteers to bake for the bake sale. I put up the posters and Mr Drummy made an announcement about it on the loudspeaker. On the Thursday I went around again to remind people to bring in money. On the morning of the bake sale I was slightly nervous. However when I arrived into the canteen, I saw tables full of donations. And they kept coming. Loads of my friends came in and helped me set up the room. I got a video ready to play on the TVs and gave my helpers T-shirts. By small break, The place looked really professional. The actual bake sale flew by. I was working on my own draw table, and I seemed to be making loads of money. When the bake sale finished, I asked a few girls to count the money while I cleaned up. When the finished counting they told me we had raised €2000. I was indescribably happy and proud. It was enough tor 11 life Changing, and possibly life saving surgeries. The rest of the day we continued to try and sell the cakes. The winner of the draw was a sixth classer called Henry. He won a brand new Sony Xperia smartphone, and was delighted. Overall, the bake sale was a huge success. That afternoon I wrote thank you notes to everyone who helped me along the way, and gave Mrs Ní Mhártín flowers. I am so glad it went so well, and I can't wait to see the difference this makes in the lives of these children around the world.
During the summer before TY, I traveled to Rome for an International Student leadership conference (ISLC) held each year. I was blown away. I listened to Operation Smile volunteers, donors and even people Op Smile had treated. I, along with 600 students from around the world, was completely fascinated. Right then I made a promise to myself that I would do what I could to help this amazing work. As soon as I returned from the conference I got on the phone to my auntie. She was delighted that I was so inspired and gave me A few ideas on how to fundraise for this cause. Then, while the idea was still fresh in my head, I emailed the vice-principle Mr Drummy to tell him about the experience. I told him how I wanted to organise a fundraiser during my fourth year. I kept in regular contact with him over the year, until eventually I organised a meeting with Mr Geraghty to pitch this fundraiser. I prepared for weeks in advance to fully decide the best way to ask permission for the fundraiser. The meeting went well, and I got the go ahead for a bake sale and draw on Friday the 27th of April. The next think I needed to do was organise the bake sale itself. I traveled into the Operation Smile Dublin office and got T-shirts, collection buckets and posters to help promote the bake sale. Then the week before the bake sale I told my year head, Mrs Ní Mhártín about what I was doing. She was really helpful and reminded me of loads of things I had to check. I talked to Brian from the kitchen and he said I could use the dining hall during small break of Friday. On the Wednesday before the bake sale I gave a speech to the TY group. I spoke about what Op Smile is and about my own involvement. I then walked around the school with some helpers and asked for volunteers to bake for the bake sale. I put up the posters and Mr Drummy made an announcement about it on the loudspeaker. On the Thursday I went around again to remind people to bring in money. On the morning of the bake sale I was slightly nervous. However when I arrived into the canteen, I saw tables full of donations. And they kept coming. Loads of my friends came in and helped me set up the room. I got a video ready to play on the TVs and gave my helpers T-shirts. By small break, The place looked really professional. The actual bake sale flew by. I was working on my own draw table, and I seemed to be making loads of money. When the bake sale finished, I asked a few girls to count the money while I cleaned up. When the finished counting they told me we had raised €2000. I was indescribably happy and proud. It was enough tor 11 life Changing, and possibly life saving surgeries. The rest of the day we continued to try and sell the cakes. The winner of the draw was a sixth classer called Henry. He won a brand new Sony Xperia smartphone, and was delighted. Overall, the bake sale was a huge success. That afternoon I wrote thank you notes to everyone who helped me along the way, and gave Mrs Ní Mhártín flowers. I am so glad it went so well, and I can't wait to see the difference this makes in the lives of these children around the world.
WHAT IS OP SMILE
Operation Smile is a charity that I have done work with over my TY year. It is an international medical charity that specialise in surgeries for children in developing countries who are born with cleft lip, cleft palate or other facial conditions. A cleft lip and/or palate is when some parts of the face do not join together properly in the womb. A cleft lip can range from a little notch in the lip to a complete separation of the upper mouth which can extend up and into the nose. Since 1982, Operation Smile has Sent thousands of missions to third world countries. They have provided hundreds of thousands of free surgeries to these children. Only an estimated 6.3% of global surgeries go to the poorest third of the world. Op Smile are working hard to even out these figures, by sending volunteers to the poorest countries to help. The way I'm involved in this charity to start off is through my aunt Ruthie. She was a nurse that went on 27 of these medical missions around the world, and was directly involved in changing hundreds of children's lives. Ruth told me about this Student leadership conference held each year, and convinced me to go on one last summer. I listened to Operation Smile volunteers, donors and even people Op Smile had treated. I am training to go on a mission within the next two years, and can't wait. I also did my week of community service in their Dublin office, and organised a school bake sale as a fundraiser, where I raised over €2000 for their cause. I believe strongly in the mission of Op smile, and I think it was a great cause to fundraiser for this year.
Operation Smile is a charity that I have done work with over my TY year. It is an international medical charity that specialise in surgeries for children in developing countries who are born with cleft lip, cleft palate or other facial conditions. A cleft lip and/or palate is when some parts of the face do not join together properly in the womb. A cleft lip can range from a little notch in the lip to a complete separation of the upper mouth which can extend up and into the nose. Since 1982, Operation Smile has Sent thousands of missions to third world countries. They have provided hundreds of thousands of free surgeries to these children. Only an estimated 6.3% of global surgeries go to the poorest third of the world. Op Smile are working hard to even out these figures, by sending volunteers to the poorest countries to help. The way I'm involved in this charity to start off is through my aunt Ruthie. She was a nurse that went on 27 of these medical missions around the world, and was directly involved in changing hundreds of children's lives. Ruth told me about this Student leadership conference held each year, and convinced me to go on one last summer. I listened to Operation Smile volunteers, donors and even people Op Smile had treated. I am training to go on a mission within the next two years, and can't wait. I also did my week of community service in their Dublin office, and organised a school bake sale as a fundraiser, where I raised over €2000 for their cause. I believe strongly in the mission of Op smile, and I think it was a great cause to fundraiser for this year.
YSI SPEAK OUT
At the start of fourth year I was selected as one of 40 students to join the Saint Gerards Young Social Innovator group. We were split into two teams of twenty. After an election, I was chosen as leader of my YSI group. Then, after two months, the two YSI groups merged to form one group of 22 students. We chose the social issue of homelessness, and together worked on lots of fundraisers and awareness spreading throughout the year. Then, on Tuesday the 20th of March, we had our YSI speak out in Dun Laoighre. The week leading up to this event was slightly stressful, but thanks to some great ideas from students, we came up with a script. Lily-Kate and I were the leaders and therefore the narrators of the speak out. We had to practice speaking about what our YSI group did this year. On the day of the speak out we took a bus to the Royal marine hotel in Dun Laoighre. The conference room was full with students like us. At the start I was worried about speaking infront of such a large audience, but after seeing all the groups before me, I swallowed my nerves. Once on stage the performance went really well. I spoke clearly and with confidence. Our presentation looked good and made sense. We were told afterwards by some on lookers that we were one of the best groups to perform. Unfortunately we still don't know how we ranked on this day, but it felt good to tell people about the good work we were doing.
At the start of fourth year I was selected as one of 40 students to join the Saint Gerards Young Social Innovator group. We were split into two teams of twenty. After an election, I was chosen as leader of my YSI group. Then, after two months, the two YSI groups merged to form one group of 22 students. We chose the social issue of homelessness, and together worked on lots of fundraisers and awareness spreading throughout the year. Then, on Tuesday the 20th of March, we had our YSI speak out in Dun Laoighre. The week leading up to this event was slightly stressful, but thanks to some great ideas from students, we came up with a script. Lily-Kate and I were the leaders and therefore the narrators of the speak out. We had to practice speaking about what our YSI group did this year. On the day of the speak out we took a bus to the Royal marine hotel in Dun Laoighre. The conference room was full with students like us. At the start I was worried about speaking infront of such a large audience, but after seeing all the groups before me, I swallowed my nerves. Once on stage the performance went really well. I spoke clearly and with confidence. Our presentation looked good and made sense. We were told afterwards by some on lookers that we were one of the best groups to perform. Unfortunately we still don't know how we ranked on this day, but it felt good to tell people about the good work we were doing.
CAROL SINGING
On Thursday the 21st the YSI group of Saint Gerards took a bus into Saint Stevens Green shopping centre to sing carols. The aim of this was to raise money for tigly, a charity for helping the homeless in Dublin. We wore Christmas clothes and arrived in there at 12 pm. At first we were nervous and shy because we were missing some core singers from our group, However as time passed we got more comfortable and involved. As our confidence grew, so did the amount of donations. We spent two hours singing there and by the end, we were exhausted. My voice was gone, but it felt really nice to raise money for a good cause. We later discovered that we raised over €2000 that day. It felt great and I would recommend that anyone that gets the chance to work for a charity should take it.
On Thursday the 21st the YSI group of Saint Gerards took a bus into Saint Stevens Green shopping centre to sing carols. The aim of this was to raise money for tigly, a charity for helping the homeless in Dublin. We wore Christmas clothes and arrived in there at 12 pm. At first we were nervous and shy because we were missing some core singers from our group, However as time passed we got more comfortable and involved. As our confidence grew, so did the amount of donations. We spent two hours singing there and by the end, we were exhausted. My voice was gone, but it felt really nice to raise money for a good cause. We later discovered that we raised over €2000 that day. It felt great and I would recommend that anyone that gets the chance to work for a charity should take it.
HAMPER AND BAG PACKING
On Tuesday the 19th of December the TY group took place in St Vincent de Paul hamper packing. We missed school that day to go down to the sports hall. We were split into 12 different groups and were lead by team leaders in fifth year. We gathered all the ingredients and then began packing the boxes. The ingredients were simple things like baked beans and ketchup. It really made me think how lucky I am to be able to take those things for granted. Each group packed hampers, and we packed 290 hampers in total. I really enjoyed this activity as I felt I was making a difference in the community. It was a great experience. Later that day we went down to the sports hall again to pack Dignity Bags for the homeless. These bags contained simply things like toothbrushes and shampoo. We worked as a year group to pack these bags and ended up packing 180 dignity bags. It was a really good feeling
On Tuesday the 19th of December the TY group took place in St Vincent de Paul hamper packing. We missed school that day to go down to the sports hall. We were split into 12 different groups and were lead by team leaders in fifth year. We gathered all the ingredients and then began packing the boxes. The ingredients were simple things like baked beans and ketchup. It really made me think how lucky I am to be able to take those things for granted. Each group packed hampers, and we packed 290 hampers in total. I really enjoyed this activity as I felt I was making a difference in the community. It was a great experience. Later that day we went down to the sports hall again to pack Dignity Bags for the homeless. These bags contained simply things like toothbrushes and shampoo. We worked as a year group to pack these bags and ended up packing 180 dignity bags. It was a really good feeling