Kishoge CC was named ‘Best Educational Building’ at the LAMA Community and Council Awards 2017 held on Saturday 4^th February.This is a national award organised by all of the county councils in Ireland. Kishoge CC had strong competition from the other shortlisted buildings from Wicklow, Cavan and Cork.

Principal Niall Hare, speaking on behalf of the school community, expressed delight at winning the award:
‘The school community – students, parents and staff – are very conscious of how fortunate we are to have a beautiful, state-of–the-art educational facility. We believe that the design team of McCullough Mulvin Architects have brought a lot of imagination to bear on the design of the building.
We like the brightness: no opportunity to bring light into the school was lost – big windows, ground-to-ceiling glass panels, skylights.
We like the modern design – the funky tilts and twists of the corridor ceilings, the creative uses of concrete in pillars and walls, the attractive signage, the clever use of wooden panels.
We like the generous proportions of the social spaces especially our soaring PE hall. This sense of proportion is added to by the height of ceilings, width of corridors and size of internal doors.
We like the way in which outdoors and indoors are blended, indoor spaces wrapped around the sensory garden and internal courtyard.
We find that the building contributes to an environment that supports high-quality teaching and learning.”

Mr Hare thanked Cllr William Lavelle, South Dublin County Council, for nominating the school for the award and Deputy Principal, Maeve Joyce, who took to the red carpet on the night to collect the award

Pupils and students of Dublin & Dún Laoghaire Education and Training Board across 16 schools, colleges and further education centres will benefit from a new approach to learning with the launch of iTunes U Site on Monday 7th
December 2015. https://vimeo.com/149277581

DDLETB’s iTunes U courses are now live on iTunes. This new education platform was launched at an impressive exhibition of digital learning projects in Tallaght involving students from Community National Schools, Colleges, and Further
Education centres who are piloting the initiative.

iTunes U is Apple’s collaborative learning app which can house multiple resources in a streamlined learning environment. An initial group of over 70 teachers in 16 centres of learning have undertaken professional training in using iTunes U to
create, edit and manage entire courses for the iTunes U platform. They are also sharing their ongoing course work with each other.

A library of iPads has been made available for teachers to use. Resource materials prepared specially by teachers will form the content of the iTunes U Courses. Students will be taught using a mix of traditional and digital means. Teachers and students can collaborate in an open learning environment.

iTunes U provides user-friendly technology with a wide choice of options to suit the needs of a class. Courses on the app can vary in length depending on the needs of the learner. Teachers can deliver classes in an organised and streamlined manner with a new easy-to-use app which learners can access on their iPads. iTunes U allows users to access courses and notes at any time, receive course updates directly onto their iPads and submit assignments to their teacher and get direct feedback.

Paddy Lavelle, CEO of the DDLETB launched the programme and said: “This is exemplary of the forward looking approach to skills development that we want to see for every pupil and driven by our teachers. It’s truly exciting to be at the
forefront of the merging of traditional teaching methods with advanced digital technologies that will underpin and support the skills of our teachers and are easy to use for our students. It’s going to be really interesting to see how students react
to the initiative and the long term results iTunes U will impact on teachers and students”.

The iTunes U project is now running an initiative in maths and science in 7 schools across DDLETB. If you are a 1:1 school or an iPad class set school and are looking for a virtual learning environment please contact sconroy@ddletb.ie.

Visit the DDLETB iTunes U Site
https://itunes.apple.com/ie/institution/dublin-dun-laoghaire-education/id1004374997