Parents
Parents’ Association
Parents and guardians play a key role in the life of the community in the College and we welcome volunteers from the parent body to partake in the many activities which take place during the academic year. Parents from all years are represented on the Belvedere College Parents’ Association however all volunteers are welcome in all areas via the Parents’ Association.
Should you wish to contact the Parents’ Association please send an email to our Chairperson Colleen Savage here
Resources:
1.) PA Committee Members 2022-23
2.) PA Constitution
Parents Talk No. 1 2022/2023: Fuel for body, mind and soul.
The first PA talk of the 2022/23 academic year was arranged to coincide with the school pastoral calendar. The topic was ‘Fuel for body, mind, and mood’. The speaker was the eminent Dr Brendan Egan, who is an Associate Professor of Sport and Exercise Physiology, and currently Head of School for the School of Health and Human Performance at DCU. Dr Egan’s current research investigates skeletal muscle function and adaptation across the life course, with special interest in the synergy between nutrition and exercise interventions ranging from athletes to older adults
Presentation Slides Click here
2021/2022
Parents Talk No.3 2021/2022-Digital Wellbeing and Online Safety for Young Adults.
Do you know what your teenagers are doing online? Do you understand the risks associated with being online?
In this digital world it is critical that we as parents understand the online world so that we can support our teenagers to navigate it safely.
The links below include information on the platforms teenagers are using, digital literacy and wellbeing and the inherent risks of being online: oversharing and privacy, cyberbullying, sexting, grooming and digital footprint.
Summary of the Talk- click here
Presentation Slides click here
Parent Talk No.2 2021/2022
On the 27th of January we were delighted to be joined online by OB, Jim Culleton Artistic Director, and CEO of Fishamble Theatre Company. Jim spoke about creativity’s role in the development of life skills and future careers and why leaders and future leaders need creativity to thrive. Aileen Bridgeman, teacher from Belvedere College Drama Department and Dylan Jones, Rhetoric student & Officer responsible for Drama, shared insights from the Colleges vibrant Drama & Music Departments’ – and detailed the value getting involved in the creative arts in the College has in broadening every student’s education.
Fishamble is an Irish theatre Company that discovers, develops, and produces new plays of national importance with a global reach. It has toured its productions to audiences throughout Ireland, and to nineteen other countries. It champions the role of the playwright, typically supporting over 50% of the writers of all new plays produced on the island of Ireland each year. Fishamble has received many awards in Ireland and internationally, including an Olivier award.
Summary notes:
• We can learn a lot from the Dramatic Arts, in theatre you cannot postpone – the show must go on! In Theatre lateral and ‘outside the box’ thinking are required, skills like these are hugely valuable and can be transferred to all aspects our working lives.
• Pivoting, whether that be in the Arts or Business, and learning from each other are mutually beneficial.
• Ireland is renowned for creativity and a world without out it would be very dull. Businesses need to support the Arts and place greater value on it, enabling it to grow from 0.1% of GDP to the European average of 0.6%.
• Literature & Drama allows individuals to see the world differently, it increases empathy.
• Theatre, Creativity, and the Arts and placing value in it offers huge benefits – we learn intrinsically who we are, we learn about ourselves and others. The Arts are fundamentally about being brave and taking risks.
• The Corporate sector in Ireland have developed partnerships with Fishamble under the Friends of Fishamble Scheme which have benefitted them in terms of Team Building and improved Communication skills.
• The ‘live environment’ of theatre is wonderful, allowing us to enter our own imagination and view the world in a unique way.
• Teacher, Aileen Bridgeman’s creative experience led her to Belvedere College and her skills gained from music, art history and dramatic performance transfer readily into her role as Form Tutor.
• Belvedere College has a strong and vibrant Drama & Music Department and the NCCA Junior Cycle breaks down subjects to include creativity across the curriculum.
Download the Powerpoint presentation here
Parents’ Association Talk 2021
On the 30th of November 2021 we were joined by Olympian, Accredited Sports & Performance Psychologist, RTE Sports Analyst & PhD Researcher, Jessica Barr.
Jessica’s talk focused on the “What, Why, How & When?” of Sports Psychology and she highlighted that Performance Psychology has a much more varied application than what people think, it can be transferred to professional settings like; business, music, medicine & academia.
Slides from Jessica’s talk can be read here
Summary Notes are as follows:
• A Sports Psychologist is not a motivational speech maker, a relationship with players/athletes must be established first. Using a ‘cake analogy’ it cannot be made without the basics; Sports Psychology is the icing on the cake that brings everything together.
• Why start to use SP if performance seems to be ok? Overthinking or pressure from nerves might set in whereby strategies need to be put in place.
• What does success look like? There will always be ups & downs in performance, but it is how an individual recovers from the down times that is key for building resilience. Success looks different for different people & depends on our perception of success.
• What are our goals? Setting SMART goals achieves success.
• Laying out a plan broken down into small processes is key. Often reality can get in the way of any plan resulting in dips & troughs. Resilience is the most crucial factor – how do we recover and build on our resilience?
• What happens when we get a setback? Bring everything back to the controllables, focus on what we can control.
• Building confidence is about working on the negative self-talk, negative self-talk will affect performance. Speak to yourself how you would speak to a friend or family member – be confident without being overconfident. Nerves and performance are interlinked. Change the thought process.
• Stress hinges on demands (workload) & resources (knowledge) (time). If we procrastinate our stress increases.
• Where there is resistance to study/work/sport – understand it, talk about it, where is that resistance coming from? What’s the underlying feeling, is it a skills issue? Citing the Self Determination Theory of human motivation and personality – individuals need autonomy & choice, or they will give up.
Teenagers – Alcohol and Drugs
Advice for Parents
Notes from a talk by Professor Jim Lucey
Professor Jim Lucey is Clinical Professor of Psychiatry at Trinity College Dublin and a Consultant Psychiatrist at St. Patricks University Hospital, Dublin. He has over thirty years’ experience in clinical and academic psychiatry. Professor Lucey communicates regularly in the national media.
For parents of Belvedere College, the objective of the presentation was to answer the below questions:
1. What is addiction?
2. What should I know?
3. What can I do?
Professor Lucy used a range of slides throughout his presentation, what follows is a parent’s summary.
An Introduction to Sustainability
By Patricia Kane
Pat Kane is the founder of Reuzi, a one stop shop for minimal waste lifestyle. Reuzi’s mission is to spread the word about sustainability. Pat works with small businesses, corporates, schools and private enterprises. She completed a business sustainability course with the University of Cambridge.
What is sustainability? In its simplest definition it is ‘To ensure a safe and just space for humanity – a planet on which all humans can thrive without compromising the ability of the planet to keep sustaining life’.
We can start by making a few changes here and there in our day to day lives. No one person is going to make a change, but lots of small changes will make a big difference.
Can we ensure our rubbish is disposed of correctly in our bins? Food waste goes into composting bins. Only place recyclable items into recycling bins. Other general waste into bins. An important message to remember when recycling is not to squash lots of items into a box. All items should be placed separately into the recycling bin.
Did you know?
• 25% of all waste in Ireland is FOOD waste
• Each one of us creates 57.9KG (128 lbs) of waste
• Only 34% of plastic waste is recycled
• Ireland is the top producer of plastic waste in the EU per capita
• Top 3 items of litter Cigarettes 54.4%, Packaging items 18.2%, Sweets & food litter 18.1%
Food Waste
In Ireland 1 in every 5 kids go to bed hungry, 1 in every 8 adults experience food poverty, €700 worth of food is thrown out of households per year and 25% of all waste in Ireland is food waste. We have to do something to change this. On the one hand we are talking about food poverty and hunger in Ireland and yet 25 % of our waste is food waste.
Can we please rethink the ways in which we shop for groceries and also the way in which we plan our meals so that we use all items prior to them going off.
Textile Industry
We are all aware of greenhouse gases but what most of us may not know is that the textile industry is responsible for 8% – 10% of all greenhouse gases. According to Pat the emissions released by making 1 t-shirt equate to driving a car for 35 miles. Imagine.?
Remember the following when trying to be more sustainable
REFUSE, REDUCE, REUSE, REPAIR, RECYCLE and or ROT
We were also joined by members of the Green Schools Committee Oisin Keating McDermot, James McDonagh, Devin Synott and Dylan Birthistle who each gave an overview of the phenomenal work the Committee undertakes in supporting a greener environment within Belvedere College. We were given an insight into the Urban Farm, Biodiversity and the work that goes into achieving and maintaining the 5 Green Flags. In 2020 Belvedere College was awarded the Green Flag for Biodiversity. This means the school has a total of 5 green flags having been awarded them for Energy, Water, Litter, Waste and finally Biodiversity. To read more about this please visit www.belvederecollege.ie Green schools update.
Other Events (Click to download PDF)
- Pat Coyle- Minding ourselves and our Families at Christmas
- Nutrition and healthy eating for parents and teens Brendan Egan PHD
- Managing wellbeing during a crisis- Stella O’ Malley
- PA Present New Student Council Ties to Council Members
- PA Host a Talk on Positive Mental Health for Teenagers
- PA Host a Talk on Drug Awareness
- PA Unveil New Piano 5th December 2019
- Elements Parents Social Evening
- Parent Information Evenings 2022
- Parents Ignatian Group
- Ladies Committee
- Belvedere College SJ Parents’ Association Notice for Annual General Meeting
- PA Agenda
- Letter to Parents re: AGM
- Honorary Secretary’s Report
- Treasurer’s Report for 2020 – 2021 academic year
- Parents’ Association Constitution
- Parents’ Association Constitution
- Parents’ Association AGM Minutes
- Letter from Chairperson of the Belvedere Parents Association
- Notice for Annual General Meeting, Tuesday 20th September 2022, 7pm. O’Reilly Theatre
- Annual General Meeting Agenda
- HM Letter to Parents
- BOM Nominee Paper
- Nomination Paper for AGM
