Irish Examiner view: Ever more reasons for optimism

The joy of students returning to classrooms yesterday was palpable to the point of being infectious

Fatima Alsattous and Treasure Uvama students from Presentation Secondary School, Tralee delighted to be back at school yesterday. Picture: Domnick Walsh

Though it is best to ration war-time analogies, they can, occasionally, be more than apt. This morning, one from 1942 — Churchill’s “end of the beginning” speech reviewing the second battle of El Alamein — seems appropriate. It is, still, a perfect distillation of achievement and confidence, but resolutely tempered by the scale of the challenges unmet.

Churchill knew it was important to recognise longed-for achievement, but that by understating the remaining challenge that achievement would, ultimately, stand for naught.