Tallaght and Lucan schools in running for Young Social Innovators of the Year awards

By Brendan Grehan

TWO LOCAL schools have been named Young Social Innovators challenge award winners and now have the chance to be named Young Social Innovators of the year.

St Aidan’s Community School in Tallaght won the “Make our country more inclusive and poverty free” challenge for their project “Deal with the wheels”.

St Joseph’s College in Lucan won the “Make our world fair and just” challenge for their project “No limits”.

The two schools are just two of the 11 teams that have been selected out of 456 teams to compete for the 2017 title of Young Social Innovators of the Year.

The students will be invited to present their projects to a panel of judges at the YSI Awards taking place on May 11 in the Convention Centre Dublin.

The YSI Awards recognise and celebrate excellence in youth-led innovation for social good.

Over 800 students from around the country are expected to attend the event.

As well as the Challenge Awards, an additional six teams will be awarded in a variety of other categories and, this year will see the first Young Social Innovators of the Year 2017 Junior Award being presented following the introduction of a new social innovation programme by YSI for Junior Cycle students.

Another 10 teams will receive Highly Commended Certificates at the ceremony.

Speaking about the Young Social Innovators 2017 Awards, Rachel Collier, Co-Founder and CEO, Young Social Innovators told The Echo: “Year on year we see hugely innovative projects from young people across the country, and this year is no different.

YSI empowers young people to come up with innovative responses and actions for change on issues they care about.”