In Pictures: Limerick students dominate at national coding event

LIMERICK students scooped four prizes at the 13th National Scratch Coding Competition, which saw top-scoring teams from schools and clubs across the country demonstrate their projects to judges.

At the judging, held at University of Limerick, two prizes went to pupils of Milford National School, with a Judges' Award presented to a pupil at Scoil Idé, Corbally and a Special Scratch Award for a pupil of Banogue NS.

The band of winners from the Treaty County included Milford National School, Castletroy, in the junior infants to first class category; Daniel O'Sullivan, Milford NS, Castletroy, fifth class to sixth class category; Muhammad Qadri, Scoil Idé, Corbally, received a Judges Award; and Martin O’Driscoll, Banogue NS, Croom, who won a Special Scratch Award.

Scratch is a visual programming language that helps children to build key coding skills in a fun and interactive way.

The Scratch Coding Competition promotes computing and software development at both primary and secondary school levels and has grown since 2010 alongside the growth in interest in coding.

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Dr Clare McInerney, Education and Public Engagement Manager with Lero, the company who organised the competition, said, “there were 280 entries in this year's competition, a big increase on last year and an excellent gender balance, at 56% male, 44% female.

Forty-five students made it to the finals and the panel of 15 judges was very impressed by the quality and originality of the projects on show,” she added.

Mary Cleary, Secretary General of the Irish Computer Society added that the scratch competition “gives young people a chance to show both their creative and critical thinking, as well as their innovation.”