Young Cork people honoured at Garda National Youth Awards

A YOUNG Cork woman who helped organise summer youth camps, a teenager who cared for her sister suffering from a rare illness, and two West Cork secondary school students who set up a social hub for their fellow pupils, were among the winners as the Garda National Youth Awards were presented at a ceremony in the Midlands Park Hotel, Portlaoise.

The awards at the weekend, which grew from a divisional awards scheme established in 1995 by Bandon-based youth liaison officer Garda James O’Mahony to become a national project in 2019, are aimed at recognising the excellence of young volunteers.

A total of 25 awards were presented across five catergories with young people from Cork, Offaly, Dublin, Kerry, Sligo/Leitrim, Mayo/Roscommon, Longford, and Donegal among the winners.

Deputy Garda Commissioner Anne Marie McMahon said at the presentation that the day was about recognising the dedication of young people and how they supported one another and their communities.

Casey Cullinane, from Knocknaheeny, was presented with an Individual Award. She was described as believing in the “value of encouraging those her age through positive experiences”.

“That’s what motivated her as Cork’s regional Representative for the Knockadoon Youth Project, to organise for a group to be able get involved in summer activity camps,” the citation read.

“This required funding and so Casey undertook a number of fundraising efforts that led to 10 young people from her area to have the opportunity to go away on a summer camp at Knockadoon. This is something that would never have been possible for these people without Casey.”

Another individual award winner, Heidi Harnedy, from West Cork, was just 11 when she began caring for her baby sister, Maya, who was diagnosed with a rare health condition.

“This was a difficult undertaking for someone of her young age but Heidi would time the length of her baby sister’s seizures, soothing her once they had subsided while also helping to care for her two other younger sisters at the same time,” her citation read.

Tragically, baby Maya passed away earlier this year and, in her memory, Heidi began her fundraising efforts by way of ‘The Wildflower Seeds’ to collect money, some of which is to go towards funding research into the rare condition of her baby sister and another portion is to go towards paying for accessibility upgrades for her local playground so children with special needs can make use of it in the future.

Coláiste Pobail Bheanntraí students Yvonne Lynch and Farrah O’Shea helped break down barriers among their peers with their hard work and can-do attitude in the school’s special needs centre, the Hub, and this was recognised with a Group Award. “Both young women are driven by their love of helping others,” the award citation reads, which pointed to how Yvonne and Farrah volunteered their time in taking weekly trips to see the residents in the local nursing home, keeping their community clean alongside the West Cork port’s Tidy Towns volunteers, and they also work in a local charity shop.

“They are wonderful advocates for the use of sign language and are always encouraging those they meet to become familiar with its use.

“They’re never not fundraising or planning their next initiative to benefit people.”