SPAR School Zone concludes with 102,860 students reached through the initiative.

904 Schools took part in weeks of football themed Primary School activity sheets designed for in-class and remote learning.

Wednesday, May 5, 2021

The SPAR FAI School Zone reached over 102,000 primary school children throughout Ireland. The digital learning resource was created for teachers and parents of primary school children in 4^th, 5^th and 6^th class.

Interactive and engaging activity sheets, designed with both the classroom and home-schooling in mind, were delivered. The programme ran throughout March and April to help children and schools get through the absence of football in schools.

Activity sheets were delivered twice a week over the course of 4 weeks to 904 primary schools, with 1,252 teachers delivering the lessons. The initiative saw 56,419 boys and 46,441 girls registered to enjoy the lessons, covering core subjects such as Maths, History, Geography, English, Art, Irish and Healthy Eating. This represents 45% female participation.

Each registered school was entered into a competition to win prizes for their school and one school from each county was selected to win a specially commissioned SPAR FAI football kit. The winners are revealed below.

Congratulations also to Scoil Eoin in Crumlin, Co. Dublin, who were selected as the nationwide winner and will receive a virtual meet and greet with members of Stephen Kenny’s international team.

SPAR’s support of the SPAR FAI School Zone is a continuation of SPAR’s dedication to grassroots football and was developed as an extension to the hugely successful SPAR FAI Primary School 5s Programme, which had to be cancelled this year due to Covid-19 restrictions.

FAI Schools and Third Level Programme Co-ordinator John McGuinness said, “The success of the SPAR FAI School Zone is a reflection of the great work of teachers across the country that have continued to bring a fun learning environment to the classroom, despite the difficult challenges that the past year has thrown up.”

“Our partners SPAR has shown great support for this initiative from day one and they continue to be a tremendous support both nationally and locally through their network of retailers in communities across the country.”

“We hope that the SPAR FAI School Zone provided fun and engaging activities for boys and girls nationwide and we are delighted to see the return of the beautiful game to pitches across the country this week. We are looking forward to a successful return to the SPAR Primary 5s later in the year.”

SPAR Sales Director Colin Donnelly said, “We’ve been supporting the FAI for more than six years now through our ground-breaking sponsorship of the SPAR Primary Schools 5s Programme,”

“It’s been an exceptional year for teachers, parents and students and we are delighted to see that so many children throughout Ireland were able to take part and benefit from the lessons that the SPAR FAI School Zone provided.”

“The overall success of the programme has been a testament to the commitment of our community network of SPAR Retailers around the country, whose involvement with their own local schools continues to drive the participation and success of this great initiative. We very much look forward to working with the FAI next year to continue supporting these great grassroots programmes.”

Parents and teachers can still register to receive this year’s activity sheets here - https://www.fai.ie/domestic/spar-fai-school-zone/register

SPAR School Zone County Winners Breakdown

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