Agree To Agree Programme

By Sophie Malone, TY 

Thirteen of the TY Students in Athboy Community School have been working hard with their Year Head Mr Hurley over the course of a couple of weeks to research and get information for the ‘Agree to Agree Programme’, a programme to help to teach mainly parents with students in primary school about the dangers of different social media apps and how to let their children use them safely. 

The 13 split into groups to focus on different apps; Tiktok (Savanagh Reilly, Zuzana Lotach and Aimee Coughlan), Instagram (Michalina Rozycka, Sean Quigley and Nikas Tupikas), Snapchat (Linas Archipovas and Cian Mulligan), Discord (Sophie Malone and Kayleigh Farrell) and VSCO (Jake Fullham, Owen Mc Connell and Ben Brady). 

On the 13th of January the group went to O’ Growney National School, Athboy to meet the Principal Mr. Hanly to plan the information meeting evening to be held the following night. 

On the 14th of January the O’ Growney parents gathered in the P.E. Hall of the school while the TY students set up information stalls at the back of the auditorium. 

Mr Hanly opened the event by addressing those gathered, thanking the parents for being there and the TY’s for giving up their time to deliver the training. Each parent got a booklet that the TY students had created with all the information needed to be safe on the apps that their sons and daughters may use now or in the future. 

After Mr Hanly, a guest speaker Paula O’ Connor took to the stage to talk about the use of social media and online gaming (for example games such as Roblox and Fortnite) by mainly pre–teens and younger teenagers, and how quickly those can lead to upsetting things being shown to them. She also spoke about her own experiences as a mother in relation to social media. During the speech she advised parents that as well as monitoring their children’s social media use, it is important to also talk to and communicate with them about internet safety, and to try to make sure they feel like they could talk to their parents about it. 

At the end of Ms. O’Connor’s speech, Mr Hanly invited the parents to take the opportunity to talk to the TY Students on how to safely navigate social media accounts. 

The night went well, with the parents and other attendees being impressed with the hard work and knowledge of the TY students, and that they took the time out of their evenings to come to the primary school and be involved in the programme. 

Pictured are (Back L-R) Mr Hurley (TY Head), Savanagh Reilly, Nik Tupikas, Linas Archipovas, Cian Mulligan, Ben Brady, Michalina Rozycka, Sean Quigley. 

Front (L-R) Aimee Coughlan, Kayleigh Farrell, Sophie Malone, Owen McConnell, Jake Fulham, Zuzanna Lotach.