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THOUSANDS OF TEDDY bears left as tributes to the Manchester Arena attack victims are being donated to charities across Manchester.
Almost 2,000 teddy bears and soft toys were left in St Ann’s Square in the city following the terror attack on 22 May.
The attack saw 22 people killed and hundreds more injured when a device was detonated in the arena following an Ariana Grande concert.
Alongside toys, thousands of letters, gifts and flowers were left in the square.
This week, the teddies will be sent out to children through charities in the Greater Manchester area, including Wood Street Mission and The Toy Appeal.
After the attack, the teddies were all collected by shoe-makers Timpsons.
Members of the army of Women’s Institute (WI) took the teddies from Timpsons and washed and repaired all of them. The teddies all now clean and ready to head off to new owners.
Speaking to Manchester Evening News, Judith Suckling, vice president of Old Trafford WI said: “When we first heard about the attacks we really wanted to help in some way.
“We had talked about doing a fundraising with WI, we talked about doing a collection, but when we were approached about cleaning and drying the teddies we thought it was a fantastic idea to do something to help.
She said that the teddies had a strong smell of rain and damp and the WI made the decision to wash them all and restore them to a fit for purpose state.
A teddy is a symbol of happiness and all of the teddies are smiling.
People left them as a tribute, and maybe they were sad when they were leaving them but I think the people that left them will be surprised that so much love and care has been taken.
“They’re going to be passed onto charities and they’re going to be given to children to enjoy for the rest of their journey.”
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The point of the calculated grades wasn’t to level the playing field so all schools would be treated the same, it was to try and mimic the results each student would have gotten had they sat the exams. Previous results from schools should have been taken into account.
@Paddy Cullen AIWS: That wouldn’t achieve it either considering school performances fluctuate each year.
@Rochelle: we have league tables for years and yes they fluctuate but if a school consistently achieves then why should they be punished
@john s: Thankfully we don’t have league tables for schools here, Sunday Times does some table. School league tables is a British thing and they are a pox.
@john s: because they didn’t get those results, somebody else did. Their teachers gave an estimate of their points. It was based around that estimate.
@Aidan O’ Neill: yes but what were the downgrades based on. If a school consistently achieved high scores year on year what is there to justify downgrading students from that school disproportionately to the national average.none students being punished
@Paddy Cullen AIWS: Coming from a teacher myself, it is a disgrace on the students who completed their L.C last year and went on to take a year out for whatever reason. Or even those who went on to do a plc last year, didn’t get their course after the plc so had to reapply through the CAO now. How can these students stand a chance of getting the course they wanted after the points rocketed? Very, very unfair on these students. Seen the impact first hand. Shame on the government for not making it fairer for those students. A total disgrace.
Heard the principle of the institute on the radio today. She was very structured in her arguments and unless she completely lied then they and their pupils have been absolutely robbed.
@john s: what station was she on. Wouldn’t mind listening back
@Daniel Guiney: heard a clip on newstalk on Ciara Kelly’s slot don’t know if she was live or not just heard the end. But yes I agree with the poster.
@Sarah Cullen: thanks for that. Found it on newstalk breakfast about 2/3 the way through
@Daniel Guiney: TV3 5.30 news
@Daniel Guiney: it was Yvonne o’Toole on newstalk breakfast
@john s: from an study done in uk and Australia among kids who got the same points in their Leaving Cert exam, those coming from public schools did better in the university than private school goers (with the exception of top achivers in both type of schools who did equaly well).
So when she says private schools have been robbed, she is right, those extra points belong to the well paid efforts private schools put to give their students an optimal learning enviroment so they can do better in the Leaving Cert exam than kids who can’t benefit from it.
But, the extra points don’t belong to the students personal capabilities and effort and in that sense students have not been robbed. On the contrary, normal circunstances gift them with extra points based on economic inequality in detriment of kids coming from lower income parents.
They will open a Pandora box by going to court with this.
That’s ridiculous. Fair enough trying to help out disadvantaged schools but if they don’t have the smarts, I’d rather a neurosurgeon from a privileged school carry out my surgery.
@Nomad: Ridiculous comment. Schools like the institute of education tell their students how to answer questions, rote learning, no figuring it out for themselves.
@Fephie Stitz: rote learning like every school in Ireland
@Fephie Stitz: Nonsense. If a doctor taking a tumour out of my brain know how to do so because they’ve repeated in practice 10000 times and got it right 10000 times. I’ll take it over the “helped” doctor that got 80%.
@Nomad: can I ask how it went the first 9999 times??
@Nomad: are you implying that people who go to fee paying schools are smarter?
No students are being marked up that’s the point. Do you want your surgeon to be in the job because daddy could afford all the assistance to get his dumb ass into college or someone who genuinely worked for it.
Ask yourself why you don’t meet too many surgeons with working class accents.
@Nomad:
Do you really think the leaving cert is the most important qualification for a neurosurgeon?
It’s not like they’re letting kids skip college this year, they still have to do a college course like
@Nomad:
You know removing tumours isn’t on the biology paper yet, yeah? You don’t even need to remove one tumour to get 625 points in your leaving cert.
Just so you know like
@Nomad: You’re a muppet if you think the LC has any standing after completing an undergrad.
Yes, some people just aren’t fit for academics — I won’t lie to you. But the LC is an ~adequete~ filter to determine who is most likely to finish their chosen undergrad based on their grades. It doesn’t determine how well you’ll actually perform in the undergrad, because it just can’t. In STEM it might have a stronger correlation but I stand by my point. Whether Dr D4 got more points than Dr DEIS doesn’t matter, what matters in the end is how they performed in their undergrad and clinical placement.
@Nomad: I’d rather one who got through college. If they get through medical training their secondary school doesn’t matter. Even if somebody is gifted 600 points in the leaving they’d still have to get through a fair amount of training
@Nomad: if I had to choose a surgeon base only in their secundary school I would definitely go for the disadvantage. Kids with no extra resources, no material motivations and no educated parents to guide them need to rely on hard work, sense of responsability and personal capabilities. I want that in my surgeon.
Private schoolers have a whole structure making their learning optimal, but once they go to university and are in equal grounds kids from public schools seem to do better than those coming from private.
Great headline for the government. High achievers thrown under the bus
@Jonathan Furlong: more like government introduces policy to balance the inequality in our society.
Thankfully we dont have a class system like the uk where the wealthy help each other allomg and the commonors kniw their place.
If it were the other way around and the DEIS schools were claiming to be hard done by there would be hell to pay with politicians falling over themselves to condemn the methods used.
@Gerard O’Sullivan: exactly. It was a choice between further disadvantage the already disadvantaged or an equal system that doesn’t award extra points due to your bank balance.
Government made the right decision here. Those from the fee paying schools have the resources to still be fine. Those from poor areas do not.
It’s an absolute mess. Every single aspect of it will be subject to numerous court cases in the coming years.
@Adam Conroy: you’re dead right Adam. Some of these students will potentially be robbed of 100,000s in income over their career because of this.
@Nomad: don’t worry their rich parents will still pull strings to get them into high paying no riffraff allowed jobs.
@john doe: nice chip on your shoulder there John..
Boost these disadvantaged schools every year then
@eoin carroll: Yes, it’s called the HEAR scheme. But it’s still not enough.
@SL: Not everyone in DEIS schools automatically qualifies. There’s an income threshold in place too, so lots don’t qualify even if just above it even though you have the same schooling and experience as everyone else there. That was the case when I was in school anyway.
Not all high achievers were in private schools or grind school, this fiasco has destroyed many students, punished because the school they attended consistently get high grades, again the squeezed middle got squeezed again
The inflation was at the lower end of the results scale. Two out of three higher achievers did not get their preferred course choice. Once the LC was abandoned, it was never going to be fair – it was a strategic choice who to disadvantage: the group that got it were the hard working, dedicated and yes generally middle class. So the advantage d were disadvantaged.
Grind school students have the option to sit the leaving cert in October if they feel that their grades do not reflect their ability. Yes, it sucks for them having to wait until next year to see if they get enough points for the course they want. Especially when so many have already taken a year out to repeat the leaving cert. But at least they have the option to sit the exam and get the grade they deserve. A lot of other countries are not providing this option.
@Donal Mc Carthy: Dónal can you please tell me what you did 7 months ago… It’s not comparable to if they did the exams 2 weeks after finishing school when doing it 7 months after. Akin to asking a student to repeat the leaving cert the following year with no tuition in between. It’s all a mess but the most unfair bit is the random selection of marking up and down like the German school who assigned 50% of the students H1s in the class and something like 14% were awarded this mark and their class mates marked down for no other reason than just because.
@Sarah Cullen: All I’m saying is they are lucky to have an option to sit the exams if they are not happy with their grades. Students in Scotland and England just had to lump it.
I’m not sure I buy your 7 months argument. I missed an exam once in college and had to sit it half a year later. My grade was in line with what I expected. Many people sit college exams a 12 months after finishing the class work.
@Donal Mc Carthy: Dónal you are right it’s all luck this year. No reflection on the student just literally those lucky enough to be awarded high grades. Anyone who did well will forever be the one who was lucky which isn’t fair either.
Uncanny really to think a pandemic has turned out to be of benefit to more ” Disadvantaged ” schools! Seriously is that what it takes!
@Colette Kearns: we could just award everyone 6 H1 grades at birth
To be Honest I would say 98% of students happy with results.
It was a though time for them and the uncertainties were stressful up to getting results.
More so the Government have done a good job on the handling of it also..
My own daughter and friends were very happy and thought their grades were as good as they would have gotten.. bar it seems 1 they thiught it should have been higher as was their best subject.. this was across the board
Need to do what UK did.
Give students the choice to pick the Teachers predicted grade or the Government adjusted grade whichever is higher and run the CAO offers again! Then no one can complain.
What happens next year when the students who will have to sit the exams and their results are not as good (ie) the grades deflate back to normal. Those students will be competing with students from this years unearned inflated results if this years student is deferring for a year or if they decide to change courses.
I think that this has been the best possible result. The grind schools have been gaming the system for years in a system that is supposed to ensure the most able kids make the hardest to access courses. Well-off families are the only ones who can afford the Institute and similar. This is the first year in a while that the third level access gap has closed, not widened.
Don’t forget that the private schools have still done better than the public schools – it’s just that the gap is less this year.
Minister for education – not educated.
Take your bell curve and ding-a-ling where the sun don’t shine.
Does anybody else find it infuriating that we have Simon Harris one minute dictating to us about health policy and the next minute Mr education. Absolutely everything that’s wrong with the political system. Why can’t we have qualified people designated to areas that they are qualified in?
Majority of kids got 1st choice.
Some private schools who specialise in dealing with repeats are upset, most students sitting their repeat LC in these institutes had already attended 5 or 6 years in another private schools…
So a few spoilt brats are unhappy.
Tut tut
So with 6% considering legal action based on losing out due to no “school profiling benefit”. Does that open the door to the thousands of former non fee paying students who may have been denied an opportunity to pursue their chosen field study because of institutional bias to also take legal action against the Dept. and seek compensation? I suspect that it might be worth a review to see if their constitutional rights may have been violated. Just a thought!
Then the points go upper so even if you did well then you still might not have enough. If you deferred a year you are worse off.
Hard paper round had simon
I can’t imagine how stressful this must have been for people taking it. At least that can take written papers if not happy I believe
Coming from a teacher myself, it is a disgrace on the students who completed their L.C last year and went on to take a year out for whatever reason. Or even those who went on to do a plc last year, didn’t get their course after the plc so had to reapply through the CAO now. How can these students stand a chance of getting the course they wanted after the points rocketed? Very, very unfair on these students. Seen the impact first hand. Shame on the government for not making it fairer for those students. A total disgrace.
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