Mayo winners at Young Environmentalist Awards

THE Cloghans Hill Teen Turn/Mount St. Michael team have won the Junior Eco-Community Development category at the national Young Environmentalist Awards.

With a record-breaking 500 applications, the awards, hosted by ECO-UNESCO, recognise the efforts made by young people aged 10 to 18 years old who have worked towards improving the environment.

Teen Turn created the H4H app where people, particularly those that are homeless, can seek donations, food, services and second-hand items. The app addresses the environmental aspect of reducing, reusing and recycling food, clothing and household items that would otherwise end up in landfill.

Young people are mentored in Cloghans Hill school each week as part of the Teen Turn initiative and as well as being named winners, the team were runners-up in two categories. The team members, who go to school in Mount St. Michael, who won the community development award were Orlaith Heaney, Aoibheann Mangan, Sophia Hession and Caoimhe Monaghan.

A second team from the school - Anna Farragher and Theres Devassey - were runners-up in the Junior Innovation Award for their project Beekeepers - What’s Buzzin? They created a device that will help beekeepers monitor their bees, the temperature of the hive as well as the humidity of the hive to keep the bee population high.

Cloghans Hill NS also had a team project that made the finals in the super juniors - the only primary school category.

Due to Covid-19, the announcements were made online in place of an event which is usually hosted in Dublin each year. Former President Mary Robinson made an address while RTÉ radio presenter Tara Stewart announced the winning projects.

To celebrate the occasion while young people are at home, ECO-UNESCO organised a week-long set of events including workshops and webinars from key experts.

* Pictured, the H4H app team.