A class of graduate midwives found themselves on the 'Nice List' this Christmas after Santa appeared on their virtual graduation ceremony to congratulate them.
Due to Covid-19, the National Maternity Hospital (NMH) midwifery class of 2021 had to have the clinical part of their ceremony held virtually rather than at the hospital. The academic side of the degree course, which is in partnership with University College Dublin, was held at the college albeit a week later due to Storm Barra.
At the end of the online event earlier this month, and following videos of congratulations and good wishes from staff at UCD and the NMH, Santa Claus made a surprise guest appearance assuring the graduates that they made it on to his 'Nice List'.
"Given that the ceremony was virtual, I wanted to do something creative", says Theresa Barry, Clinical Placement Coordinator at the NMH.
"Before the end of the ceremony I said: 'We now have a final video for you all, a special Christmas wish. This gentleman needs no introduction and is well known to students and staff here in the NMH. And perhaps this is the most important take home message for you all before Christmas.'"
1/4 #ChristmasMagic at The NMH
— The National Maternity Hospital (@_TheNMH) December 10, 2021
Not #COVID19 nor #StormBarra could stop our BSc Midwifery #Classof2021's #Virtualgraduationceremony. This is the 2nd year that the graduation has had to be held virtually & we wanted to add a little bit of extra festive magic & sparkle pic.twitter.com/puSVkKUAhc
Ms Barry said the graduates presumed that the Master of the National Maternity Hospital, Prof Shane Higgins, was who she was speaking about as he would normally be at the graduation. However, he was unable to attend the event as he was attending an emergency at the time. When Santa Claus appeared on screen, she said the graduates got a great surprise.
"They were delighted, it was such a surprise for them," she said. "Some of the graduates were videoing the message and others had children on the video as well and they were looking at Santa. They really did enjoy the personal touch."
Aisling McDonnell, one of the graduates at the ceremony, said that she was not expecting to see a video from Santa and that it was a lovely personal touch which really added to the day.
Ms Barry came up with the idea when she visited Santa with her family at Causey Farm in Co Meath recently.
She said that she decided to have a quiet word with Santa’s elves to add some Christmas magic to the graduation ceremony.
"He couldn’t have been nicer," she said. "He and the elves went to the time and trouble to facilitate the recording.
"When we left the farm we were wondering ‘Was that the real Santa?’"
