After a nail-biting two hours St Etchen’s National School in Kinnegad won joint first place in Competition A of the finals of the Credit Union All Ireland Schools Quiz which was held in the RDS on Sunday April 3.
Ultimate Big Brother champion Brian Dowling joined the Irish League of Credit Unions to host the special 20th anniversary event. Over 400 primary school children from across the country competed for the national title.
The Kinnegad team was made up of Conor Kelly, Aisling Kelly, Ben Kirwan, and Ruairi Flynn.
The annual event, now in its 20th year, was run throughout the winter months in communities all over Ireland by volunteers from ILCU affilliated credit unions. The quiz has become the highlight of the school calendar, attracting over 25,000 participants in over 300 venues throughout the 32 counties in the lead up to the national finals.
With the aim of encouraging teamwork among young school children under the age of 13, the questions for the quiz are compiled by primary school teachers and covered topics such as geography, history, music, literature, and sport.
Speaking at the event, quiz master Brian Dowling said, “Everyone, including myself, had so much fun! Congratulations to St Etchen’s on a fantastic win. The RDS was packed and you could see that all of the teams had been working really hard to prepare for this. It was really exciting being involved in the quiz, I enjoyed every minute of it!”
Also commenting on the successful annual event was ILCU president Mark Bailey. “We wholeheartedly support the development of young people in communities all over Ireland. We are delighted to be here again marking the 20th anniversary of the Schools Quiz. I want to say a big thank you to our volunteers from credit unions nationwide who work incredibly hard to make sure this event is a success year on year. The purpose of the credit union movement is more than merely providing financial services and this is a very important event for the credit union movement. This is a way for children around Ireland to have lots of fun while learning the importance of teamwork in achieving success.”
