A young Donegal man is on his way to achieving great goals through a PLC course in Sport Recreation and Exercise.
Myles Mulgrew from Milford is almost at the end of a one-year Post-Leaving Cert course in Errigal College with Donegal ETB’s Further Education and Training (FET) Service, which has already boosted his prospects for progressing to Third Level education.
The 19-year-old fell short of the Leaving Cert points he needed to study sports in college last year. However, he didn’t let that stop him and he decided to use his gap year to develop more vocational and technological skills.
Myles Mulgrew
Myles told Donegal Daily: “Instead of working or sitting around for the year, I thought I would go and get a new qualification. Sport is a big passion of mine but never something I thought about going into professionally.
“The PLC course is giving me time and helping me see if it is something I would be interested in as a career.”
Myles is enjoying balancing practical and academic work in the PLC course. Modules range from soccer, GAA, basketball, health and fitness, nutrition, health and safety, nutrition, communications and more.
“There is a good mix of subjects and we be out coaching first and second years in the school. You’re always looking forward to being outside at some stage in the week,” he said.
Work experience is included also. For this, Myles completed a rewarding placement coaching the Special Olympics Team in Letterkenny.
On the back of his PLC studies, Myles has already gained an offer from Ulster University to study sports if he achieves a merit. He is also using his year to study Leaving Cert Spanish to have a third language under his belt.
“I’m thinking about sport or doing teaching through arts now,” Myles said, as he plans his progression to Third Level with new possibilities,” he said.
He is keen to recommend the PLC to other learners with a passion for sport.
“I would say 100% do it if you have any kind of interest. It gives you a great taste of what a sports course would actually be like in college,” Myles said.
Donegal ETB’s FET Service also offers this course in Stranorlar through Finn Valley College and two other sports-based courses (surf instructor and beach lifeguard and an outdoor activity instructor traineeship).
You can apply online for all of them through www.fetchcourses.ie.
Some of these courses are co-funded by the Government of Ireland and the European Social Fund as part of the ESF Programme for Employability, Inclusion and Learning (PEIL) 2014-2020.
