This is the website of the Ennis National School Parents Association. All notices to parents from the association are posted here. We also publish any notices from the school principal or the school board of management. Every parent or guardian with a child attending Ennis National School is a member of our association. You can find out more about the association on the Parents Association page and if you would like to get involved in supporting our committee just let us know by emailing the committee. If you have any suggestions as to how we can improve our work or our website please let us know.

The school website is www.ennisns.ie.

We had our first meeting for this new school year last week where we discussed our upcoming AGM.  We hope to hold this during early October where we would welcome new committee members to become involved.  I will post a definite date for this meeting within the coming days. 

We have not forgotten our ‘New School’ campaign but while we are still putting our very serious concerns forward in various media circles we are waiting tentatively for what we hope to be positive news from the Government during late September / early October.

We had an incredible turnout with over 1500 people supporting our Protest today.

This whole process of organising this event only commenced 14 days ago when we asked for parent support for the path we felt we had to take and it is incredible to think that the culmination of the support offered in such a short period of time has been illustrated by the level of attendance we had today.  It is very important to stress that this event combined with others that will occur in the near future are a combined sustained effort from all elements within the school including teaching staff, principle, board of management, and the overall parent body.  We hope by combining all our efforts into one well coordinated approach at refusing to accept our current situation will demonstrate to government our determination to have this issue resolved for once and for all with the realization of the new school we have been promised and deserve as being the only solution acceptable.  

It is very important that we thank the children of the school that drew on their creative sides of to compose the very original multi lingual slogans on display especially the senior classes. 

We would sincerely like to thank everybody involved and to thank those who could not attend who have supported our attempt to bring our predicament in to a wide public arena with this rally today. We all know that the business of government takes an extended siesta in the coming weeks and we hope that what we have done here today will give them some food for thought during the lazy days of summer, I assure you we will not be taking the same sojourn and will continue to coordinate our effort during this time.  If you have any suggestions of how we should go forward please feel free to contact any of the BoM or the Parents Association. 

Please keep a close on all the media coverage over the coming days, we expect huge coverage even nationally!

Your guide to healthy school lunches.

Children need to eat a variety of foods everyday to be healthy. Parents can give children a healthy school lunch that tastes great and is good for them too. Many parents say one of the major problems with school lunches is when the children bring them home!
Try to give children some choice about what they take for lunch, and if possible, get them involved with preparing the ‘healthier’ foods. Choosing food for a healthy lunch is easy.

Hint:
Use the Healthy Eating Pyramid to plan a healthy school lunch.

Unfortunately St. Patrick’s Day this year falls during the school Easter holidays and participation of pupils and teachers is made more difficult than ever. Nevertheless Ennis National School will once again be represented in a growing and popular Ennis Town Parade of Monday 17th. At 11 a.m.

The theme of this year’s parade is “Celebration” and members of our school band and school teams of different codes will join with others in a celebration of their performances and successes over the past number of years.
We look forward to the occasion.

On Wednesday February 7, Mr Walsh’s 4th class set off for Coole Park, just outside Gort. The children were to take part in the educational programme run by the Centre there. We were welcomed by Hilda McLoughlin who introduced us to our “outdoors” guide, Gordon Darcy.

Gordon then took us on a hike through the woods stopping every so often to draw our attention to red deer, bat boxes, Whooper swans, Ice-Age boulders, a Monterey Pine ( enormous ), swallows’ nests, “dusty” catkins, etc. We estimated the age of the Monterey Pine at 240 years by getting the children to join hands around the trunk. Some of the children even reported seeing a pine-marten scampering up a tree. Gordon finished the walk at Coole’s famous autograph tree where the famous ( and some not-so-famous ) have left their mark.

After lunch, Hilda McLoughlin took us on a tour of the exhibits in the Centre. These included a cat mummy, an autographed fan (signed by Mark Twain and Teddy Roosevelt amongst others), children’s toys from a hundred years ago and a collection of stuffed animals and birds. They also played “Hunt the Thimble”.

As we got back on the bus, it started to snow but despite the children’s prayers, it didn’t last.
Thanks to Hilda, Gordon and to Deirdre Larkin who accompanied us on the day