Coverage examples: Every week we take a look at the stories sent through MediaHQ’s press release distribution tool and post the best covered ones in a weekly blog. For this week, Communications clinic, Macra na Feirme and An Taisce EEU made it to the top of our list.
1) Communications Clinic
Title: People of Cork Encouraged to Participate in 100K in 30 Days Event to Raise Funds for The Marie Keating Foundation
Author: Aileen Gaskin
Email delivery rate: 100%
Time of release: 11:02 on the 24th April
Coverage examples:
Pictured is Cork 100k in 30 Days Ambassador Anna Murphy.
To arrange a phone interview or sound bite please call Aileen Gaskin 087 7724 717
Press Release
24th April 2023
People of Cork Encouraged to Participate in 100K in 30 Days Event to Raise Funds for The Marie Keating Foundation
Event Has Raised Over €4million To Date For Breast Cancer Services
100K in 30 Days have teamed up with the Marie Keating Foundation to support their vital breast cancer services and organisers are calling on the people of Cork to sign-up for the June event.
Marie Keating lost her life to breast cancer 25 years and her son Ronan Keating will be running 100K across the 30 days of June to raise awareness and show support for the Foundation he and his siblings set up in her name. Joining Ronan in the challenge is his wife Storm, children Missy and Jack, Dancing with the Stars Judge Arthur Gourounlian, Today FM presenter Dara Quilty, broadcasters Glenda Gilson, Norah Casey, Laura Woods and Anna Daly, to name but a few.
2023 is the fourth year of the event and to date over €4million has been raised for breast cancer services in Ireland, including the state-of-the-art Clinical Trial Centre in the new Breast Centre at Beaumont Hospital.
Ronan Keating said:
“We are delighted to team up with 100K in 30 Days in aid of The Marie Keating Foundation’s vital breast cancer services. We lost Mum 25 years ago, she was just 51. Mum’s cancer was one of the most curable forms of breast cancer but unfortunately she didn’t know enough about it. That’s why it’s crucial that we get the message out there of the importance of early detection, it can save your life! So much money has been raised by so many people over the last three years and The Marie Keating Foundation are very grateful to be the chosen charity for the 2023 100k in 30 Days challenge, and we will do all we can to make this the best year yet.”
100K in 30 Days was founded by Co. Louth (Blackrock, Dundalk) couple Niall Carroll and Cara McAdam and launched in 2020 after Cara was diagnosed with breast cancer. They are delighted to team up with The Marie Keating Foundation for this year’s event.
Liz Yeates, CEO of the Marie Keating Foundation and breast cancer survivor, said:
“Some of the breast cancer services provided by the Marie Keating Foundation that will benefit from this year’s event include our community nursing service, Schools Cancer Awareness Programme, , Comfort Fund, BRCA Peer To Peer Support, Survive and Thrive Programmes and Positive Living Workshops supporting our Cancer Community at every step.”
Steven McKenna, CEO of Sherry FitzGerald said:
"We are thrilled to once again be lead sponsor of 100K in 30 Days for the third consecutive year. Our 550 employees from over 100 offices around the country eagerly anticipate this event in June as it serves as a fantastic team building opportunity, albeit a highly competitive one. Breast cancer has affected so many people, and we take pride in supporting The Marie Keating Foundation."
100K in 30 Days for breast cancer in aid of The Marie Keating Foundation takes place over the month of June. Organisers are calling on everyone – runners, walkers, those in wheelchairs, families, colleagues, schools, community groups and sports teams, whether you’re based in Ireland or abroad, to join the #pinkarmy and take part in the June event. Registration is now open at www.100kin30days.ie.
Instagram @100kin30days
Twitter hashtags #100kin30days & #pinkarmy
ENDS
For further information contact Aileen Gaskin 087 7724 717 / aileen@communicationsclinic.ie
Editor’s Notes
About 100K in 30 Days
100K in 30 Days sponsored by Sherry FitzGerald in aid of The Marie Keating Foundation began in June 2020 after Cara Carroll, from Dundalk, Co. Louth, was diagnosed with breast cancer. Cara is an avid runner and ran all during her treatment months which inspired her husband Niall to setup the 100k in 30 days fundraiser.
About the Marie Keating Foundation:
It is 25 years since the Marie Keating Foundation was set up, following Marie’s death from breast cancer in 1998. After losing their mother, the Keating family promised that they would do everything they could to ensure men and women in every community in Ireland had access to the necessary information to prevent cancer or detect it at its earliest stages. The Marie Keating Foundation supports families across Ireland at every step of their cancer journey.
Through its community information service, the Foundation’s nurses have engaged with over 600,000 people about the causes and risk factors of cancer. The Foundation offers national cancer awareness and education campaigns covering the most common cancers affecting people in Ireland, including bowel, testicular, breast, cervical, lung, prostate, and skin cancer.
Given the fact that there are more than 200,000 cancer survivors in Ireland today, the Marie Keating Foundation supports cancer survivors through its Positive Living and Survive & Thrive programmes, which are run nationwide, free of charge, for men and women. Over 1,200 cancer survivors have attended courses and seminars since the programmes’ inception in 2014. The Survive & Thrive Programme is aimed at assisting anyone who has come through treatment to adjust to their ‘new normal’ and offer practical advice and help in many areas of life including diet and exercise, emotional support and adjusting to returning to work. The Positive Living programme is for men and women living with advanced cancer and supports them in coping with their specific physical and psychological needs. The Foundation’s recently launched survivorship website www.surviveandthrive.ie has a host of information and advice for anyone living with or beyond cancer.
The Marie Keating Foundation has best-of-class corporate governance structures having achieved the ‘Triple Lock’ standard for best practice governance in the charity sector and having won a Good Governance award in 2021.
About Breast Cancer Services at The Marie Keating Foundation
PREVENTION, EDUCATION & EARLY DETECTION
Community Nursing Service
Our team of dedicated oncology and community nurses visit workplaces, community groups and public spaces bringing cancer information straight into the heart of communities nationwide.
Three Mobile Information Units are stocked with take-home information leaflets and packs on all the common cancers enabling this important information to be taken home. Specialist burses travel all over the country providing information to thousands of women and men on how to maintain a healthy lifestyle, how best to reduce your risk of cancer, and how to spot cancer early.
Schools Cancer Awareness Programme
The Marie Keating Foundation’s unique Schools Cancer Awareness Programme aims to help secondary school students all around the country learn how to reduce their risk of cancer and how to spot the signs and symptoms early. Delivered by their specialist nurses, the programme makes cancer ‘less frightening by enlightening,’ by engaging students with age-appropriate, interactive, and informative material.
Corporate Wellness Workshops
The Marie Keating Foundation’s Corporate Wellness Programme offered by our specialist nurses, brings workshops on how to spot cancer and on healthy lifestyle choices to reduce your risk of cancer into the workplace. These can be general presentations or bespoke for the specific audience. These workshops aim to help give employees the tools they need to spot the sign and symptoms of all the common cancers early while also helping to reduce their risk of developing cancer and maintain good health. To help support those working from home to stay healthy and aware of the signs and symptoms of cancer their nursing team also offers the corporate wellness workshops via webinar, bringing our vital information and advice to you from the safety and comfort of your own home.
SUPPORT SERVICES
Comfort Fund
A cancer diagnosis can place a huge strain on the person diagnosed both physically and emotionally, but with the inability to work, and the additional costs associated with treatment, cancer patients can also experience a lot of financial strain during this period. The Comfort Fund was designed to try and meet this need and provide grants for those experiencing financial difficulty as a result of cancer treatment. Since 2014 the Foundation has been able to provide financial assistance to 4350 families coping with cancer treatment. Over the years, the demand for this service has grown exponentially, and the current cost of living crisis is further increasing the pressure on the fund. The Comfort Fund is entirely fundraised and receives no Government funding so is heavily reliant on the generosity of the public and the Foundation’s corporate supporters.
BRCA Peer To Peer Support
For men and women who are carriers of BRCA gene alteration, it can be difficult to find support and advice from people that understand the journey you are undertaking. Receiving a positive BRCA gene diagnosis means both men and women are at far greater risk of developing certain types of cancer including breast, ovarian and prostate. Trained by the Marie Keating Foundation, the BRCA peer to peer supporters are a group of BRCA positive volunteers who have learned to navigate their diagnosis and are here to help you and answer any questions you have related to your BRCA experience. The Foundation also holds a number of BRCA support group meetings each year and hosts Ireland’s only BRCA conference every April.
SURVIVORSHIP SERVICES
Survive & Thrive Programmes
The Marie Keating Foundation’s Survive & Thrive Programmes have been running since 2014 and were created to help men and women who have finished cancer treatment to adapt to the ‘new normal.’ The programme consists of eight sessions run by one of their trained nurses and a cancer survivor which gives other cancer survivors the information, tools and support they need to navigate their onward recovery after treatment. Issues and topics covered including chronic fatigue, nutrition, and the fear of recurrence. Survive and Thrive programmes run nationwide on-line and in person and are free to attend.
Positive Living Workshops
Being diagnosed with a metastatic (advanced) cancer can be a lonely and isolating time filled with complicated emotions and questions. To support those diagnosed with stage four breast cancer, a community who have their own set of emotional, physical, and practical needs separate to other cancer patients, the Foundation’s Positive Living programme, led by our Director of Nursing Services provides invaluable resources and support to group members and their families.
2) Macra na Feirme
Title: Macra gets ready for 16 hours through the night to Government Buildings
Author: Derrie Dillon
Email delivery rate: 99%
Time of release: 16:25 on the 24th April
Coverage examples:
Press Release: Monday 24th April 2023
For Immediate Release
Macra gets ready for 16 hours through the night to Government Buildings
Tomorrow evening at 6pm Macra will lead a group who are embarking on a 79km walk from Athy in Co. Kildare to Government Buildings on Merrion Square. The group will leave Athy where Macra was founded in 1944 and carry a message from its roots to the Gates of power. Macra President John Keane said ‘our message is clear, we want a future in Rural Ireland, we want our Rural Communities to survive and thrive into the future. We are walking for our future and for the future of our local communities’.
Macra has written to all TD’s and Senator’s asking them to join with them on their walk and to meet them at 1pm on Wednesday at Government Buildings. Macra President Elect Elaine Houlihan said ‘ we are taking steps for our future, to ensure young people, families can live and prosper in Rural Ireland as the youth are the backbone of these communities’.
Macra has 8 key issues:
1. Accessing affordable housing and cumbersome housing planning guidelines
2. Disjointed and sparce healthcare services for rural communities
3. The Governments definition of a family farm as ‘average’ and ‘typical’
4. No recognition or engagement by Government on a farming succession scheme
5. Lack of planning for the future of our rural communities informed by rural people
6. Imposition of Quotas on Young farmers availing of grant aid support
7. Lack of public transport for rural Ireland
8. Proposals to rewet large areas of rural Ireland
Macra will be coming with solutions also and we will hand deliver these to the Office’s of The Taoiseach and The Tánaiste at 1pm on Wednesday April 26th. Macra President John Keane concluded ‘anyone who wants to join us is welcome at any stage from Athy to Merrion Square, or along our route through Kilcullen, Naas, Kill, Newcastle and into The Irish Farm Centre in Bluebell and from there to Merrion Square.
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For more information contact:
John Keane, Macra President: 085 7049175
3) An Taisce EEU
Title: St Brigid’s National School named Ireland's Travel School of the Year
Author: Sheila McCormack Cooney
Email delivery rate: 100%
Time of release: 16:00 on 26th April
Coverage examples:
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
CONTACT: SHEILA MCCORMACK-COONEY / 087 938 3768/ SMCCORMACKCOONEY@EEU.ANTAISCE.ORG
IMAGE ATTACHED
St Brigid’s National School named Ireland's Travel School of the Year
Twelve schools awarded at Green-Schools Travel ceremony
Wednesday, April 26 2023: Meath Hill school St Brigid’s National School was named Ireland’s Travel School of the Year at a ceremony in Dublin on Tuesday. An Taisce Green-Schools presented the school with their award at the event honouring the winners of this year’s Green-Schools BIG Travel Challenge 2023 in Haughton House of Dublin Zoo. Eleven other schools were also awarded on the day for their efforts in individual categories promoting sustainable and active travel modes to school.
During February schools undertook the Big Travel Challenge, which asked them to concentrate on one sustainable transport mode for two weeks to see if they could achieve real, lasting change in the travel behaviour of their staff and students. The Challenge is an initiative of the Green-Schools Travel theme, which is supported by the NTA and the Department of Transport.
St Brigid’s, a school of just 84 pupils, excelled and embraced the challenge. They concentrated on encouraging students to park ‘n’ stride to school, and saw a fantastic uptake of more than 75% of students choosing to park ‘n’ stride over the two week period. The committee got the whole community involved and had guest striders from intercounty footballers to government ministers join in on different days.
Congratulating St Brigid’s and the other awarded schools on their achievements, Green-Schools Travel Manager Ciara Norton said: “My team and I have been so inspired by the many ways schools approached the Big Travel Challenge this year. The winning schools created incredible change in a short period of time, showing the desire among young people to travel to school independently, actively and in a mode that is mindful of our climate and local environment. Well done to all!”
Eleven other schools were awarded for their part in promoting green travel modes to school as part of the BIG Travel Challenge. These are:
- Piper’s Hill College, Walking School of the Year 2023, Secondary
- St. Mark’s Junior School, Walking School of the Year 2023, Primary
- Adamstown Community College, Cycling School of the Year 2023, Secondary
- St. Aidan's National School, Cycling School of the Year 2023, Primary
- Scoil Naomh Gobnait, Carpool School of the Year 2023, Primary
- St. Brendan’s College, Carpool School of the Year 2023, Secondary
- St Brigid's National School, Park ‘n’ Stride School of the Year 2023, Primary
- Loreto Secondary School, Park ‘n’ Stride School of the Year 2023, Secondary
- St. Joseph’s Special School, Special School Sustainable Travel Award 2023
- St. Cecilia’s School, Special School Sustainable Travel Award 2023
- Scoil Mhuire, Big Travel Staffroom Challenge Winners 2023
- Presentation College, Castle Island, Big Travel TikTok Challenge Winners 2023
- St Brigid's National School, Meath Hill, Ireland’s Travel School of the Year 2023
ENDS.
Notes:
Green-Schools Travel
An Taisce has been working on the national Green-Schools Travel theme, which focuses on promoting sustainable travel on the school run, since September 2008. The Travel theme is funded by the Department of Transport and is supported by the National Transport Authority.
The ultimate aim of the Green-Schools Travel theme is to encourage students, parents and teachers to walk, cycle, scoot, Park ‘n’ Stride, use public transport or car pool instead of using the private car on the school run.
Green-Schools
Green-Schools (known internationally as Eco-Schools), is an international environmental management education programme, environmental management system and award scheme that promotes and acknowledges long-term, whole-school action for the environment, and is operating in 58 countries around the world including; almost all EU member states, Africa, South America, North America, Canada, Oceania and Asia. Green-Schools is an initiative of FEE (the Foundation for Environmental Education).
The Green-Schools programme is based on a seven-step environmental management system and continual improvement process which is very student led and also involves the wider community. Green-Schools is a themed programme with schools initially working on the themes of Litter and Waste and then moving onto themes such as Energy, Water, School Travel, Biodiversity and Global Citizenship. Schools that successfully implemented the programme are awarded the Green Flag. The award must be renewed every two years.
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