By Rosín Mernagh
Our Pledge Day for our School of Sanctuary Ireland membership application took place here in Colaiste Bride, Enniscorthy, Co. Wexford on Thursday 12th September 2024. We incorporated our Pledge Awareness Week with our annual Friendship Week because we felt that both important events complemented each other perfectly in our DEI and Sanctuary missions.
Our 5C class kindly took responsibility for running the main event and they organised a number of awareness raising activities in the days leading up to the day of the pledge:
- Daily notices about the upcoming Pledge Day on the electronic noticeboard
- Daily morning affirmations explaining DEI and the School of Sanctuary movement over the school intercom
- A poster and noticeboard campaign providing information on DEI and the SOSI movement
- A class-by-class visit to inform and clarify DEI and SOSI
On Pledge Day itself the 5C class visited each class in the school with pledge forms to gather the signatures, and a table was set up in the school foyer to allow all staff members to sign. As the forms were filled, they were placed on the noticeboard nearest to the foyer to be as visible as possible.
At 12.05 we were delighted to welcome Tiffy Allen as our honoured guest to witness our pledge. By the end of the school day, we were immensely proud to have collected the signatures of the entire school community. We then documented this important moment in our school’s life with photos of our 5C organising committee and our SOSI Student and Staff Team.
The following week, during our mass for the official opening of the school year and our annual celebration of Mercy Day, a number of our students warmly reiterated our SOSI mission and pledge for the full congregation.
This has been an uplifting and bonding learning for the students and staff of Colaiste Bride and we feel privileged to now be firmly on our SOSI journey.
