THE TIMES WE LIVED IN:AS ANOTHER SCHOOL year swings into top gear under a cloud of economic doom and gloom, it's hard not to feel for a generation which is trying to knuckle down to studies of one sort or another. The bigger 21st-century picture can be a daunting thing.
All you have to do to offset such gloomy thoughts, however, is get up close and personal with a school. Any school. If you’re signing up for an evening class, take a look at the walls and corridors around you: chances are they’re covered in posters, paintings and notices which exude an almost palpable energy, creativity and optimism.
All of which – and more – emanates from this photograph of the winners of the 1987 All-Ireland Management Competition for schools. The team of young hotshots from St Benildus College, Kilmacud, Co Dublin includes (from left) Damian Lawlor, Ross Mayne, Garret O’Neill, Fearghal O’Boyle (captain), Fergal Byrne and Adrian Crean.
The suits, the haircuts, the rowdy horseplay, the raw confidence, the well-manicured teeth: all there in spades as the lads celebrate their victory. This, folks, was at the end of the 1980s, now infamous as the most miserable time in living Irish memory. It was, as a close examination of the coiffures in this photograph proves, the era of the dodgy fringe.
Where are they now, our half-dozen management wannabes? Thanks to the wonder that is the internet we can reveal that Ross Mayne is chief executive of a Leopardstown company called Munich Re Automated Solutions Ltd, part of the international German Munich Re group. And Adrian Crean is the managing director of McDonald’s Ireland – the first Irish person who has held that exalted position, we are told.
Pretty good going for guys who emerged from secondary school at the end of the awful 1980s. They didn’t know what lay ahead of them, any more than we do now – but according to Mayne they were inspired by a “fantastic” teacher by the name of Frank Scott, now retired. We hope things turned out well for the other members of the group. In any case, take heart, all ye who pack your schoolbags this weekend.
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