€10,000 for the school plus €10,000 for the nominated local charity i.e. CoAction West Cork.

There was great excitement at St. Finbarr's Boys' N.S.  on 26th May 2009 when representatives of Folens Ireland visited the school to formally present the top prize of €20,000 which the school won in the Folens Golden Anniversary Competition.
St. Finbarr's Boys' N.S. was chosen from hundreds of applicants nationwide for the coveted top prize.

To celebrate 50 years in business Folens Publishers held a nationwide competition inviting schools to outline how their school has worked with a local charity in the past or proposes to work with a nominated charity in the future.

As we at St. Finbarr's have had a long association with CoAction West Cork we decided to nominate them as our charity.

For some time now we have had a dream of creating an outdoor Adventure Play Area for boys and on hearing of the Folens competition it seemed an obvious choice to offer to share this facility with children from CoAction i.e. Saturday Morning Clubs and Summer Camps.

Folens informed us that the hundreds of entries were firstly shortlisted to 80 which were then passed on to a panel of esteemed judges including Senator Fergal Quinn and RTE's Eileen Dunne.  On 12th May two representatives of Folens Ireland paid a surprise visit to announce that we had been chosen from the final 80 entries to receive their top Folens Anniversary prize.

We thank Folens for their generosity and vision in organising such an inspiring and worthwhile competition.  We congratulate them on their Golden Anniversary and we wish them continued success!

Seen here presenting the cheque to Ms Peggy Hurley, School Principal, is Mr John Cadell, Managing Director of Folens Ireland. Also included are Mr JP Twomey, Chairman of The Board of Management, Ms Noreen Sheahan, Marketing Director of Folens Ireland, Ms Emma O'Donovan, Cork Sales Representative, Folens Ireland, Mr Maurice Walsh, CEO CoAction West Cork, Ms Mary O'Donovan, Financial Control, CoAction West Cork, Eileen Murray, Children's Services CoOrdinator CoAction West Cork.

St Finbarr’s is a ten teacher Boys’ National School with an enrolment of 145 pupils. It is situated on Seskin Hill, overlooking Bantry Bay. The staff comprises of an administrative Principal, six mainstream teachers, two full-time Learning Support/Resource teachers, one shared Learning Support teacher and one Language Support Teacher.

Other staff includes 5 Special Needs Assistants, a secretary and a part-time cleaner. We at St Finbarr’s have always focused on the holistic development of our pupils. In conjunction with our very high academic standards, we strive to promote and develop the pupils’ many talents in the areas of sport, IT, the Arts etc as well as fostering their self-esteem, respect for God, others and themselves.

The school has received many awards in recognition of our work in these areas: Magnet School Health, Promoting School Green Flag, Digital Schools Active Schools Award, MiWadi Cultural Award.

We operate an informal Open Door Policy where parents are regularly kept informed regarding their children’s progress. Our school newsletter “Keeping in Touch” which is circulated through the school as well as on our website, keeps parents informed of what is happening in the school.
The old school was located on the Hospital Road and the present school opened in October 1980.

An interactive whiteboard is a large interactive display that connects to a computer and projector. A projector projects the computer’s desktop onto the board’s surface, where users control the computer using a pen, finger or other device. The board is typically mounted to a wall or on a floor stand.
They are used in a variety of settings such as in classrooms at all levels of education, in corporate board rooms and work groups, in training rooms for professional sports coaching, broadcasting studios and more.

St. Finbarr's has been using interactive whiteboards since 2006 to enhance the learning experience for our pupils. Being able to project web pages on screen dramatically increases the amount of teaching resources we can offer pupils.