TY Currach Programme 2023/24 with Cork Sports Partnership & Meitheal Mara
This school year we are offering TY students the opportunity to experience rowing a traditional Irish currach through the heart of Cork City. This programme will provide students with adventure and challenge while also building teamwork, personal development and a connection to Ireland’s maritime heritage.
Sessions on the water will allow students to get active while learning how to steer and manoeuvre a traditional Irish currach. Sessions in Meitheal Mara’s city-centre boatyard will give the participants a sense of the rich history and heritage that the currach represents while also affording them the opportunity to meet boat-builders and to see the process of boat-building in operation.
Students will have the opportunity to row a traditional 2-person Dunfanaghy currach. They will begin by rowing with a trained Meitheal Mara instructor. As the students grow in competence and confidence in the currachs they will be given more responsibility; gaining skills in terms of stroke, rhythm, steering, manoeuvering, reversing and berthing the currachs. As our participants gain these skills they will be able to progress to rowing with their classmates.
By setting a series of goals and challenges, in terms of the skills to be learned, we give the young people the opportunity to build their confidence. Rowing in pairs encourages teamwork within the group. Students will gain an understanding that tides and weather can impact their boat. They will grow in resilience and self-efficacy as they learn that boats do not always stay on course and to persevere when things go awry.
All rowing takes place in Cork city centre giving the young people the chance to explore and view their city from a completely different perspective – travelling under the bridges of the north and south channels.
On days where strong winds prevent rowing, students will have the opportunity to visit Meitheal Mara’s traditional boatyard. They will learn about the earliest currachs and how the boat style has been developed and adapted over the centuries. They will hear about how important currachs were vital to the island communities of Ireland, how prominently they feature in the literature from the west coast of Ireland and how a currach is said to have beaten Christopher Columbus to America. They will have the chance to meet our boat-builders and to see numerous currachs in various stages of construction.
Please complete the form below if you want your school/class considered for the programme
