Keela chosen as national hero for her environmental work

A 13-year-old student in Summerhill's Coláiste Chiaráin is firmly following in the footsteps of world-renowned climate activist, Greta Thunberg, and such is her devotion to raising awareness about her environment that she won a national award for her endeavours last week.

Keela Plunkett from Ballydangan in South Roscommon was nominated by Roscommon County Council for an environment award in the inaugural Hero Awards national competition, which was set up to honour and celebrate Ireland’s everday heroes.

The finals of the competition, which is sponsored by Paypal, Telus International and Zurich, took place on Thursday night last, January 21, in a virtual ceremony and there was jubilation in the Plunkett household when Keela was announced as the overall winner of the Environment Hero award.

A member of Bealnamulla LFC, the young environmental activist has been picking up numerous bags of rubbish in the townsland of Thomastown, Ballydangan every week for over a year now in an effort to reduce the litter in her local area.

“When we were out for our walks in the lovely country area we live in, Keela was always very conscious of the large amounts of litter on the sides of the road, so she kept pestering me to get in touch with Roscommon County Council to see if anything could be done about it,” explains her mother, Mary, who made contact with the Roscommon Litter Warden, Annette Woods Donlon.

“This was before Christmas of 2019, so Keela initially helped out with the spring clean and she has been doing a local clean up ever since, so Annette decided to nominate her for the Environment Award in the Hero Awards and we were delighted when she won the overall Award,” says her Mam.

Keela, who is a second year student in Coláiste Chiaráin, says people would not dump their litter around the countryside if they realised how much damage it does to the environment and to wildlife.

“Lately, there are a lot more facemasks being dumped and birds can get their feet caught up in the elastic, so if people even cut the elastic before they drop their mask they wouldn’t be so dangerous to birds and other wildlife,” she says.

With local authorities around the country and Tidy Towns groups having their services severely curtailed due to the impact of Covid-19 restrictions, litter picking has been hugely curtailed over the past year.

Undeterred, Keela Plunkett was given gloves, bags and litter picking equipment by Annette Woods Donlon and has continued to collect litter every week in her locality of Thomastown over the past year, earning warm praise from all the locals for her dedication to the environment.

“It drives me mad to see people dropping cans, bottles and all sorts of rubbish as I know how harmful it is to birds and to other wildlife, and I know a lot of it can be recycled, so I was really, really happy to be nominated for a Hero Award and to be recognised for what I am doing because maybe that will increase awareness in other people,” says Keela.

As part of the nomination process for the Hero Awards, Keela Plunkett had to get ten people to support the initial application from Roscommon County Council.

Her CSPE teacher in Coláiste Chiaráin, Ms Irene Halligan, was happy to support the nomination, as were a number of local business people and neighbours in Ballydangan who were aware of Keela’s tireless efforts to keep her local area litter free.

Despite being told by the host of the Hero Awards, comedian Colm O’Regan, that he could see her either becoming an environmental scientist or a Prime Time presenter asking tough questions in the future, Keela Plunkett says she hasn’t thought about a future career path yet.

With her dedication to environmental awareness and a Hero Award under her belt for her efforts, she could very well become South Roscommon’s answer to Greta Thunberg!