Pictures: County Mayor opens Rylane National School’s new garden

RYLANE National School marked the recent conclusion of the academic year with the official opening of their new school garden.

Parents, students, and staff members in the close-knit community all worked tirelessly over a number of weeks to ensure their plans for a new school garden came to fruition.

The principal of Rylane NS Brian Reidy said the result is “spectacular”.

“It was a brilliant day. We had the new elected Mayor of the County of Cork, Cllr Frank O’Flynn present to officially open it.

“A huge amount of work went into it. The work on the garden has been in operation over the last six weeks. The end product is spectacular,” he said.

“Children and parents spent the four Saturdays in May coming together to put it all together,” said the primary school principal.

“We originally had a kind of poly tunnel that was managed by a committee through Mary O’Sullivan who is a past parent. In recent times Julie Roche has been doing a huge amount of work teaching the students about planting, harvesting and seeds.”

Rylane NS, which is a co-educational school, now has a state-of-the-art school garden which caters for all the needs of the students said Mr Reidy.

“We now have four raised beds as we have four classroom groupings. The unique thing about the four raised beds is that they are not something that is built with sleepers or logs. It is turned sods that are piled across each other.

“We also have a sensory garden. We have a sensory raised bed where children can touch, feel and smell all the plants and shrubs that are growing. We have a bug hotel to look after insects. We have bird houses, and we have a poly tunnel at the top to grow our plants in the wintertime and put them into seeds.”

Mr Reidy said the new school garden will enable the students to take ownership and learn more about nature.

“Having this new school garden will help kids to learn all about how a plant grows from a seed all the way up to flower and fruit. It is a great opportunity for them to learn so much about the environment. The kids will be watering the plants and the shrubs. In the poly tunnel they will be able to see how the seeds are progressing.

“It will become an outdoor learning space as well. We will put benches there and the students can come out and do active learning. Over the summer the parents and children can continue to come in, do a bit of weeding and water the plants. It will give them a bit of ownership as well,” he added.

“We have a great school community,” said Mr Reidy.

“The parents were a huge help in getting this project off the ground. They brought so much expertise, materials, and resources to the garden. The new school garden is amazing. We are very proud of it.”

The original school building dates to 1914.

Mr Reidy who has served as principal for four years said there is a “lovely atmosphere” in the school.

“We have 73 children which range from junior infants to sixth class. It is a rural school.

“We have very good facilities. We have a school hall, two large yards, a basketball court and a soccer pitch up the back. We have a very strong parental involvement and great buy in from all our staff members.”