Cork Rose Kate Shaughnessy first to take to the Rose of Tralee Festival stage

The Cork Rose was the first to take to the Rose of Tralee International Festival stage on Monday night to share her love for her care coordinator job at a local Cork nursing home and her strong ties to the Kingdom.

Cork Rose Kate Shaughnessy is one of 32 Roses in total who are up for selection at this year’s festival.

For the first time, presenter Daithi Ó Sé was joined by co-host Kathryn Thomas who welcomed Kate Shaughnessy from Ballincollig on stage.

Speaking about her ties to the Kingdom and to the Rose of Tralee Festival, Kate said she grew up attending the festival with her parents Niamh and John who both hail from Tralee.

She said that she had lots of special people in the audience including her parents, family, friends, and her boyfriend Michael but said the residents of Norwood Grange Care Home were also tuning in on Monday night.

Speaking about her love for the job, she said: “Basically my job as a care coordinator is to make sure that all the residents feel at home in a non-clinical way so I just make sure all their needs are being met all of the time and it’s a really really lovely job, I love it.” 

She said that during the Covid-19 pandemic, she became the residents’ family at a time when family members couldn't visit.

“When Covid broke out I was actually in my final year of social science in UCC and then I went full time so that was in March and I was doing my final year exams in May. 

"And there was no one to do the video calls so I was working in a much bigger nursing home at the time with a hundred residents so I did all their video calls and window visits. 

It was very hard but it was very rewarding as well.

Kate described the support she has received from the people of Cork as “amazing” and said it was an honour to open the show on Monday night.

The remaining 14 Roses will take to the stage on Tuesday night when the winner will also be announced.