By Seamus Toomey On Tuesday, just after 4 o’clock Professor Don Barry (President of the University of Limerick) had the privilege of hitting the switch and lighting up the plaza’s sizable Christmas tree. To the backdrop of students and families and the sounds of cheering and clapping you knew Christmas had arrived. Students…
By Seamus Toomey The Arena Extension is underway and looks set to be done in its entirety by this time next year, barring any delays, An Focal has been told by Director of Sport in UL, David Mahedy. What does this mean for UL? Well, it’s good news for our clubs and…
By Seamus Toomey Decriminalisation of drugs, similar to what Portugal did back in 2001, could be coming to Ireland. Current Minister of State for the National Drugs Strategy, Aodhán Ó Ríordáin is hoping to bring this to the country amidst his belief that we need to stay focused on recovery. This decriminalisation…
By Seamus Toomey Lucy’s story is one of both prescription and illegal drug abuse and how it spiraled out of control for her. Have you ever taken illegal drugs and if so what are they? Lucy: “Yes, cannabis and cocaine. If we’re talking about valium, it’s legal how I got them but…
By Seamus Toomey The Clubs and Societies office held a survey last year. One of the many questions in this survey was “Do you use recreational drugs?”. The response by 781 students (approx. 92% of people surveyed) was 13.8% Yes and 86.2% No. Perhaps it is as simple as the statistics are…
By Seamus Toomey Recently An Focal spent a week conducting interviews with students in the University of Limerick, asking them about drugs and drug use. The idea was to gauge how students think about drugs and what are the experiences and opinions that exist among the student population. Because of this the questions…
By Seamus Toomey The masses gathered, slowly a few at a time congregating outside the Students’ Union. You could feel the difference, there was anticipation in the air, and you could see the questions resting on the tips of everyone’s tongues. Confused I looked around at the gathering crowd wondering what was about…
By Seamus Toomey Blind Boy from the Rubberbandits was on campus in Week 7 to receive the Auditors award from UL’s very own Debating Union. Auditors, Rachel Jones and Sarah McCarty of DebU were the ones who decided the Limerick-born comedians deserved the highly revered and prestigious award on the grounds that…
By Seamus Toomey Karl Spain was top notch comedy, immediately you could see his years of experience and his confidence on stage made all the difference in comparison with UL Comedy society’s beginners. It’ll all come to them eventually but it’s definitely a tangible difference and straight away Karl was getting laughs…
By Seamus Toomey SoUL Fest’s first big event happened Monday night in Scholars, Karl Spain came to perform and UL’s Comedy society opened with 4 comedians including Stephanie Leonard, Lea Wegerle, Andrew Berryman and the wonderful Amy Lee Fox accompanied by the super silly John Spillane who MC-ed for the night. Stephanie Leonard…