Transition Year Riverview Exchange
Back in October six Transition Year students embarked for the Antipodes on a four week exchange with our sister college, St Ignatius’ College, Riverview, which was founded in 1880 by Old Clongownian, Fr Joseph Dalton. Embedded correspondent, Mikey Mina Ronayne sent us this despatch from behind the lines…
“We arrived at Riverview on October 9th with high expectations of what to expect from such a prestigious school as we had been told so much about the haven that is Riverview by our peers at Clongowes and we were looking forward to immersing ourselves in Riverview life. On our first day of class we were shown around by boys in our various Houses but the majority of us still managed to get lost in the school. We were kindly introduced to the many staff members by Mr Webb and we were welcomed with the utmost hospitality.
We soon began to realise the huge size of the college campus compared to Clongowes and we got used to moving between buildings for classes. The number of pupils was also overwhelming to start with as the student body is approximately three times that of Clongowes. We quickly adapted to the new timetable and the movement throughout the day, however we were yet to adapt to the climate as most Irish people don’t take kindly to the sun, which makes infrequent appearances in our cold, rainy country.
We found the classes very interesting, in particular History and Geography, where we learnt an abundance of knowledge on Australia’s Aboriginal history and geographical issues such as the depletion of the Great Barrier Reef. Our four weeks at Riverview flew by and we all thoroughly enjoyed the time. We would like to thank Mr Webb for his tireless efforts in organising this exchange and our host parents for the wonderful hospitality they showed us throughout our visit to New South Wales.
We Clongownians left the banks of the Lane Cove River with the knowledge that our sister school has an excellent way of living out the Jesuit life. Riverview’s motto reads ‘Many wolves, one pack’, and this neatly summarises the special connection that the many Jesuit schools across the world, including Riverview and Clongowes, have.”
Mikey Mina Ronayne
Pictured above are: Rory O’Meara (front left) and (on the right from the front), Mikey Mina Ronayne, Charlie Connolly, Harry Radmall, Ruairi O’Regan and Hugh Hogan.
