Although the principal of Scoil Mhuire Gan Smal in Blarney, Co Cork, says that the school doesn't have "a specific policy decision" to push the sciences, the fact that science is a compulsory subject there up to Junior Cert, may go some way towards explaining how two of its pupils scooped the top awards in the 1999 Esat Telecom Young Scientist of the Year Competition.

Donal O'Grady is obviously very proud of 16-year-old Sarah Flannery, a fifth-year pupil who won first prize in the prestigious competition. Her winning project was the development of an advanced security code for email and ecommerce on the Internet.

Science teacher Sean Foley had a double cause for celebration just over a week ago as his son, Vincent, who is a classmate of Sarah, won the Intel Prize for Technology Excellence. "We appreciate the importance of science," says Foley. "It's an important subject to have in the core group. It's always been one of our core subjects."

The school was established in the Sixties in Blarney's old Temperance and Abstinence Hall. It was the town's first second-level school and, nowadays, its co-educational doors are open to over 500 pupils.

The Sisters of Charity took over the school in the late Sixties and it moved to its present site on the outskirts of Blarney in 1972. A science and technology block was added to the school's buildings about five years ago consisting of labs for biology and mathematics as well as facilities for physics, chemistry, metal work, engineering and wood work.

"We pride ourselves on having a comprehensive curriculum from first year to Leaving Cert," says O'Grady. "All subjects are taught here - be it home economics which was traditionally a girls' subject to physics, a traditionally male subject."

The principal oversees a staff of 32 full-time lay teachers. He says that most of the girls who continue to study science after Junior Cert tend to take biology as their science subject. "There is a reasonably good take-up in physics among the girls, but very few would do chemistry."

O'Grady says that the school promotes Christian values. "We try and get all our students to fulfil their potential and we engender them with the spirit of Christianity. We would try to make them aware of people less well off than themselves.

"There's a saying that God's gift to you is your abilities and what you do with those abilities is your gift to God."

O'Grady, 45, is a past pupil of North Monastery school in Cork city. He also taught there for 16 years. He then moved on to Colaiste Eoin in Youghal where he was principal. He has been in his present job for 18 months.

"While the school is predominately Catholic, it welcomes all denominations. A facet of the school that we pride ourselves on is the fact that we are a de facto community school although not in name.

"We are grateful to the community for sending their sons and daughters here. It reflects the confidence that they have in us and the recent success of science here shows what we can do."

Sport plays an important role in the school. There are facilities for camogie, hurling, Gaelic football, soccer, basketball and badminton. The school also organises sailing and wind surfing trips.

In keeping with what her elders would aspire to, Sarah Flannery is "a great all-rounder," says the principal. "She is really unbelievable. She's into music and sport and is a cross-country runner. She was also on the winning basket-ball team recently and she plays football."

Sarah, who has already been approached by businesses to develop her winning project, is the epitomy of excellence. Her project, which is very mathematical, had to be examined by an expert from UCD because the judges found it so hard to follow!

"What impressed the judges was the extraordinary ability she had in understanding maths," says Foley. "She didn't just show her findings to them. She took out a note pad and pen and wrote it all out.

"This went on for three or four pages. The maths were incredibly complicated. I couldn't follow them. Sarah's maths teacher is trying to digest the work at the moment. The judges simply couldn't believe that somebody of her age could have all this knowledge."

They recommended that it should be published in a scientific journal. Some commentators have predicted that the study could have huge commercial potential in the world of telecommunications. Sarah has been advised to have her system patented.

The TV programme, , inspired Vincent Foley's project. He noted that video security cameras were capable of producing only blurred images of faces. His project involved improving and enhancing the video images.

"So ecstatic was the sub-editor working on the Examiner's front page that he or she gave the success story the following headline: Blarney has gift of the gab, and gift of the lab.

Other past pupils of Blarney's Scoil Mhuire Gan Smal have been making their marks. Maurice Halissey won first prize in UCC's masters in law degree at Christmas. Aubrey MacAuliffe came second and Samantha Ryan came third.

In sports, the school won the Cork County Soccer Championship last year. Gareth Cronin plays with Cork City which won the FAI cup last year. Top class athletes include Valerie Vaughan and Paula Sheehan. The sixth-year class is particularly proud of having raised over £1,000 for charity this Christmas.