Making the National Career Skills Competition Shortlist

Recently, I have been extremely honoured to find out that I have made the shortlsit of the National Career Skills Competition. The competition was ran by Careers Portal, the leading provider of Careers & Educational News throughout Ireland.

The National Career Skills Competition is a nationwide competition, open to Senior Second Level Students in Ireland, who have participated in Work Experience, through their Transition Year, Leaving Certificate, Leaving Certificate Applied & Leaving Certificate Vocational Programmes. Each category is also offered in Irish. From over 1,500 Entries, I was extremely happy to be ‘Highly Commended’ in the Transition Year Category. 

Each entry had to submit a series of collective doccuments based around a Work Experience Placement that they have carried out. At the time of submission, I had only underwent my first Transition Year Placement in Scoil Naomh Pádraig, Drumfries, teaching music. The entry consisted of a Career Investigation, a Work Experience Report and a Skills Research Section, amongst many other sections. I researched how to become a music teacher, and followed various different pathways to acheive this goal. I also had to think about my Work Experience Placement, and about what skills I had both used and learnt through this placement.

Tomorrow, I will be heading to the Department of Education, in Dublin to recieve my prize. I am thoroughly looking forward to the event, and cannot wait to see the Department of Education. I can’t believe that I have made it this far! A special thanks has to be given to my Career Guidance Teacher – Ms McElhinney, and my TY Coordinator – Ms Bradley, who have played a vital role in my Work Experience Placements, as well as my employer and coworkers at Drumfries National School who were good enough to allow me to teach music in the primary school!

Taster Day in The LYIT

Problem Solving in the LYIT

Last Thursday, Transition Year Students were invited to the LYIT (Leterkenny Institute of Technology, to get a sample of some of the courses that are on offer in the IT. The day was organised through our Career Guidance module, as we are all at this stage considering what courses we will study in the near future. The LYIT, is also one of the largest providers of third-level education in the North-West of Ireland. The IT, has just under 4,000 students, many of whom hail from the local area.

We left the school at about 9:20, and arrived in Leterkenny at 10 o’clock. When we went in we were greeted, and were split up into two smaller groups, who would follow two different timetables for the day. These smaller groups were our respective TY classes – TY1 and TY2. TY1, My class, were first of all sent to a business workshop, where we were told about the various courses that the School of Business offers. In this time we were also given different business-related tasks on worksheets that we did in groups. In my group were – Gerard, Tomás, Adam, Aaron & Denis.

The next session that we went to was hosted by the Department of Design & Creative Media, and was very interesting and interactive. The courses that they carry out are very ‘hands on’ and very ‘creative’. We were shown some of the work that students carried in their time in the respective courses, and it was really impressive. This department focuses on the fields of Animation, Audio-Visual (AV) Production and Fashion Design.

Thirdly, we visited the ‘Sports Science’ Department, where we were introduced to their Sport Science Lab, which was very impressive, however the courses that they offer hadn’t really interested me, as I don’t have that big of an interest in sport, however the science aspect of the course had really interested me. We then broke for lunch, provided in the canteen, and returned for our final lecture.

Our last lecture was brought to us by the Department of Law & Humanities, and it was quite interesting. We were given talks on both the Languages that they offer (Irish, Spanish, French & German), and the Law & Business courses that they offer. This aspect of the IT really interested me and I was appreciative of the work that all staff at the LYIT put in to make this day possible.

Careers Fair in St. Columb’s College, Derry!

Some of the brochures received at the Careers Fair

Today Transition Year students got the chance to attend a careers fair in St. Columb’s College in Derry, accompanied by two teachers – Mrs Galbraith and Mrs Keogh. We got on the bus at a quarter to ten and headed for Derry. We arrived at the school at about twenty past ten, where we were lead to the door by a student, before being taken to a hall where many different companies, universities, colleges and IT’s had set up stands about their respective courses and careers on offer.

The stands in the hall ranged from Chemical Engineering at Queen’s University to an airplane design company! Many of the large educational institutions in Ireland and the UK had sent representatives. These included Trinity College Dublin, Dublin City University (DCU), NUI Galway, Sligo IT, Leterkenny Institute of Technology (LYIT), University of Ulster (Magee, Jordanstown & Coleraine Campuses), Queen’s University Belfast and Liverpool – John Moore University, among many many others!

We had also been given a timetable of different talks that were during three different periods throughout the day. The first talk that I attended, was a talk from Trinity College Dublin, which touched on the subjects which they offer, their entry requirementnts, examination and fees, as well as student life. 

I also went to a talk on medicine, and how you can peruse it as a career. A local Derry Doctor – Dr. O’Hagan, gave a very inspiring and insightful talk, where he talked about the challenges that he had faced when trying to peruse a career in medicine. I felt that this talk was very inspirational and his determination was admirable.

The third, and final talk that I attended was a talk on Modern Languages in Queen’s University Belfast. This talk and subject was right up my street and really appealed to me, as I would say  that two of my favourite subjects would have to be Irish and Spanish. I felt that this was a possible course that I may enroll in someday, as the course itself is to versatile and student friendly! I really liked that you could get the chance to either sit a joint honours course, in which you could study two languages – where I could study both Irish and Spanish, or sit a singe honours course where  you would study only one language –  where I could study Spahish or Irish. There is also an option to study for one year of your course  abroad. This talk has really appealed to me and I am seriously considering it as a possible course that I will study after my Leaving Certificate in 2018. 

I was extremely happy that I attended the careers fair today, as it had given me a great insight into what I may study before I even chose my subjects for my Leaving Cert –  a chance that I have only received as I am lucky enough to be in Transition Year!