Mr. Crowe’s Retirement

Mr. Crowe’s Retirement - the day itself!

On Friday, September 30th , 2022, Kilnamona National School celebrated the retirement of Mr. Seán Crowe. Having taught at Kilnamona National School since 1988, and been principal for 25 years, Mr. Crowe’s final day at school was going to inevitably be a very special day. The inclement weather conditions in the morning didn’t hamper the celebrations that went on however! Mr. Crowe called around to visit all the classrooms in the school in the morning and say a personal goodbye to each child in the school. He took photos with each class and at 11 o’clock, the children couldn’t believe their eyes, ears and mouths as the ice-cream van pulled up to the front of the school!! 

Thankfully, the wind died down and rain cleared for Mr. Crowe’s retirement mass which was celebrated at 1 o’clock. A large crowd of parents and pupils (past and present), Board of Management members (past and present), friends and former colleagues from the teaching community and the wider Kilnamona community came out to say their goodbyes and wish him well in his retirement. He was extremely happy to have his parents (John and Mary Crowe), his wife Geraldine, daughter Ruth, sisters Mary-Ita, Geraldine and Ailish and brother Martin in attendance. Sadly, Mr. Crowe’s parents have since passed away. After mass, refreshments were served at the Kilnamona Hall, organised by the Parents’ Association. People got to meet Mr. Crowe and reminisce about days gone by. This was a fitting way to mark the end to a long, loyal and committed career. 

Mr. Crowe

Mr. Seán Crowe began his teaching career in 1982 in St. Cannice’s National School in Kilkenny, in 1985 he moved back to the Banner County teaching in Scoil Chríost Rí in Cloughleigh and finally joined the staff of Kilnamona National School in 1988 and was promoted to principal in 1997 taking over from Jim McMahon. He would go on to spend the next 34 years teaching in Kilnamona National School. Mr. Crowe during his time in Kilnamona NS was many things to many people. To parents, he was always approachable, sensitive, understanding and generous with his time and expertise. 

As a teacher Mr. Crowe was kind, caring, knowledgeable, fun, and had a particular passion for History, Maths and Gaeilge. He had a tremendous knowledge of events of the past absolutely loving the 1916 commemoration in 2016. He always prepared his pupils extremely well for the transition to secondary school finding the time to fit in topics such as sets and algebra if possible in 6 th class. Irish grammar was another of Mr. Crowe’s loves. He set high standards for his pupils and was encouraging and motivating. He showed great interest in his past-pupil’s lives after they moved onto secondary school and beyond. He had great pride and interest in the local area of Kilnamona, and in his last few weeks at school, he made sure his class would experience the local area, bringing his class to Commane’s pitch and putt, visiting Jig’s Forge and Shallee Castle. 

Mr Crowe during his time in Kilnamona had a huge passion for the GAA and shared and instilled this love with the pupils. He was always very enthusiastic, from an indoor mini 7’s in the middle of winter to a Cumann na mBunscoil final in June, he had a great way of encouraging and egging on his team, be it in hurling, camogie or Gaelic Football and most importantly encouraging players of all abilities but at the same time being sporting and fair to the opposition. He had always been very committed to teams at Kilnamona National School and generous with his time, often giving over his lunch breaks to training. He had a remarkable memory to remember scores and/or weather on a particular day! He also had a passion for quizzes and preparing the pupils for such competitions as the Credit Union and Parents’ Association quiz, reaching the All-Ireland on more than a few occasions. 

As a colleague, Mr. Crowe was always gentle, kind, caring, and interested in his staff’s personal lives. He always had time to ask for their welfare. He had great wit and humour and a warm presence in the school. As principal, Mr. Crowe was an outstanding leader who was able to strike a balance between allowing teachers individual freedom in their own classrooms while at the same time maintaining high standards and expectations. He was a perfectionist and wasn’t ever afraid to embrace change, more recently having dealt with the challenge of Covid, which changed the way teaching and learning took place for a while. He embraced it positively doing Zooms and meeting the needs of his pupils as best he could. Another new experience in the last year of his career saw Kilnamona National School welcome a girl from the Ukraine who came to stay with a local host family, as a result of the war in the Ukraine. 

He had great vision for Kilnamona National School. During his time as principal, he saw many changes take place. He spearheaded the new extension in 2009 along with Tony Barrett who was Chairperson of the Board of Management at the time. In 2018, he saw the Astro-turf completed at the top of the school yard and in his last few days at the school was involved in purchasing more iPads for the school as well as a high-tech photocopier. 

To quote John O Donoghue,

“Now is the time to enjoy your heart’s desire”, 

Slán agus beannacht a Sheáin.