In keeping with Cookstown High School’s Christian ethos of serving others, Design and Technology teachers were delighted to be involved in the manufacture of over 600 protective face masks for care homes in the Cookstown area as part of the national effort to increase the availability of PPE for frontline key worker staff.
Mr P Carson, Mr D McKenna, Mr G Carleton and Mrs M Hogg worked industriously creating face masks using laser cutters thanks to the generous donations provided by our PTFA and local company, Steelweld. The High School is indebted to Steelweld for their investment, which has allowed us to reinvest in the local community and contribute to the welfare of key workers in excess of 16 local care homes and health centres. With a design using polypropylene, Mr P Carson, Head of Design and Technology, set up a production line in technology workshops with one team member laser cutting and assembling the headband and another involved in cleaning and quality control.
In an effort to reduce the isolation and potential loneliness for local care home residents our Year 10 English pupils, as part of their online learning activities, provided outreach to residents. They were tasked with sharing their personal experiences of lockdown with residents in order to provide a welcome and valuable social contact, for those unable to have visits from friends and family at this time. Pupils wrote touching letters of concern to residents, interwoven with good Cookstown humour and wit about their activities at home during lock down and how their lives have been impacted upon due to current restrictions and how they empathise with residents who are also missing contact with friends and family.
Some members of staff and wider school community have also been involved in the making of scrubs or donating fabric to ensure these items are readily available, not to mention practical subjects have given up their goggles to local hospitals in a bid to play their part. As a school, we are appreciative of the efforts of all those in key worker roles and are only too glad to be able to be a small part of the bigger picture.
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