Pictured celebrating the recognition for the Rosemount GAA Social Initiative were: Cllr Liam McDaniel, Cathaoirleach of Westmeath County Council, Michael Kavanagh, Máire Burke, Jimmy Keane, Rachel Duffy, Westmeath Age Friendly Ambassador, and John Burke.
By John Harrington
You’ll struggle to find a more vibrant community in Ireland than Rosemount in Westmeath, and that’s due in no small part to the Rosemount GAA Social Initiative.
They won yet more recognition earlier this month when they were awarded first prize at the National Age Friendly Recognition and Achievement Awards.
The award recognised Rosemount GAA Social Initiative’s success in promoting social inclusion by facilitating the participation of the older members of their community in a variety of activities and events “specifically designed to enrich their lives and respect the important contribution they have made and continue to make to community life.”
For one of the founding committee members, Jimmy Keane, it was a surprising but very satisfying night of recognition for all the work the Social Initiative has done in their community since it first got up and running in 2010.
“When we were told we were shortlisted as one of the last five out of 87 applications for the award we were chuffed with that alone,” says Keane, who’s the father of former Westmeath star John Keane.
“We never thought we'd get more than that so we were absolutely gobsmacked and thrilled on the night when we were announced as the winners of the award.
“It's a huge achievement for us. Rosemount is a small rural community of around 200 houses but there's great volunteerism in the whole community."
The Rosemount GAA Social Initiative Project brings its members on a number of trips around the country every year.
So, what exactly does the Rosemount GAA Social Initiative do? Ask Keane that question and he betrays himself as a master of understatement by saying, “it’s no one thing.”
It certainly isn’t. Since 2010 the Social Initiative has come up with a variety of ways to engage their community from multiple social outings every year to fitness classes to curating a digital archive to building club infrastructure, and that just scratches the surface.
The impact of all they have done is considerable. The Rosemount community is a thriving one where people feel connected and empowered by being part of a vibrant social movement.
“What the Social Initiative means for people here is that it gives them a great social outlet they wouldn't otherwise have,” says Keane. “They all look forward to all the different events that we have.
“You hear a lot of talk about mental health nowadays, and I've no doubt that if we didn't have our social inclusion initiative in Rosemount than a lot more of our people would suffer from mental health problems.
“We have a good mix of male and female, young and old, who take part and get an awful lot from it.
“There's a man up the road from me who is only in his late sixties but he's had a bit of a turn and can't drive the car any more and he looks forward so much to coming to the Galway races with us.
“There are other people like that who we would chaperone on trips. We had a couple, an elderly husband and wife, who would come on all the trips with us. A day after their last trip with us, a daytrip to Galway, sadly the wife passed away.
“During the eulogies in the church they talked so much about what the social initiative meant to them. It meant so much to the family that this couple had that social outlet because it was the only one they had really. It’s at times like that you realise how much the Social Initiative means to people.”
The Rosemount GAA Social Initative organises a wide variety of social activities for its members.
The Social Initiative Committee is a small, but very enthusiastic one.
Another founding member, John Burke, and his wife Marie plan each social outing with military precision by first travelling there themselves a few weeks previously to make sure they have all the logistics in order.
Payment is taken before travel, and the 50-odd people that get on to the bus together know they’ll have few worries for however long the outing lasts.
"We have around 100 people in the Social Initiative and there’s always something for everyone over the course of the year in terms of our outings,” says Keane.
“We'd have around five different trips during the year and at least one of them has a two or three-night stop-over. We always try to meet GAA royalty on the trips if we can.
“This year we did a three-day trip up to Belfast. We also headed up to Cusendall where the Antrim hurler Neil McManus met us for a talk and we had a great event there.
“We've been to Dunboyne where Sean Boylan met us. We’ve been down to Nemo Rangers Cork and met Billy Morgan and Tomás Ó Sé, and we’ve had lunch in Hayes Hotel in Thurles and Michael Ryan joined us and gave us a talk.
“If the GAA wants to promote positive mental health and wellbeing for senior members, there's no better way of getting people involved and keeping them involved that the social initiative.”
The vibrancy of a community can be accurately gauged by how well it looks after its youngest and oldest members, and Rosemount also scores very highly in that regard.
Rosemount GAA club opened a Social Initiative stand for senior citizens in 2020.
In 2020, Rosemount GAA opened two new facilities – a playground for children and a heated and enclosed Social Initiative Stand for senior citizens that seats 20 who want to watch club-teams play in a bit more comfort than usual
“It’s a great little club, we’re always busy with something,” says Keane. “Back in 2003 we bought a field, three acres and put a second playing field on it with additional dressing-rooms.
“We have an astroturf pitch, a walking track, the Social Initiative Stand, and a playground.
“This year is the club’s Centenary and to mark it we put up a memorabilia area in the corner of the grounds dedicated to club members who have passed away. I know that’s something the judges of the Age Friendly Awards were very impressed with.
“The Community Centre is also on the grounds and that’s a very busy and great facility with a car park for 100 cars.
“There’s so much great volunteering going on the whole time.”
Many hands make light work in Rosemount GAA club.
The Rosemont Social Initiative Committee always have something on the go. On Monday they finished up a 10-week course of exercise classes that offered more than just calisthenics.
Also thrown into the mix for the first four weeks was a coffee morning, followed by exercise, followed by art, followed by a bowl of soup, followed by a guest speaker on an age-relevant topic.
In a couple of weeks’ they’ll mark the 13th anniversary of the Social Initiative in some style by hosting an evening of celebration in the Community Centre where the only issue is likely to be having enough seats for everyone who will want to attend.
A recent study found that Ireland is the loneliest place in Europe. If more GAA clubs followed Rosemount’s lead that statistic would surely be addressed.