Over to you

The three Transition Year students who sent in the comments below will be spending one week's work placement in the offices of The Irish Times. You can too - if your 200-word submission on a media-related topic is accepted for `over to you'.

If you are one of the many other students who wrote to us, don't be discouraged: there are 25 more weeks to go in this year's media scope. Keep those comments coming - and be sure to include your name, your school, and phone numbers for home and school.

Aoife Dolan, Manor House School, Raheny, Dublin

Cigarette advertisements are a joke. They are merely obscure and abstract and totally meaningless to the average person. It proves that cigarette companies need no longer advertise, as they have a huge market of both young and old. Therefore the only way to combat this problem is a complete and total ban on the sale of tobacco, which causes more than 6,000 deaths in Ireland each year.

Lisa Keogh, Our Lady's School, Terenure, Dublin

Morals on television are at an all time low. Violence is depicted as a clean and easy solution to everyday problems; adults and teenagers are shown engaging in casual sex. Some people, especially parents, are angry at programme-makers for portraying such low morals as acceptable to their children, particularly teenagers. They are of course justified in their anger, right?

Wrong. It is not television's responsibility to teach children right and wrong. It is not the job of programme-makers to ensure their work is suitable for everyone. It is a parent's job to make sure children are not watching a programme with an adult theme. Forcing television stations to raise our children is a reflection on a society that refuses to take responsibility for its actions and words.

Robert Farrelly, Castleknock College, Dublin

U2 popped home for two spectacular shows at Lansdowne Road, proving to all their critics that Popmart was a success - despite reports to the contrary. U2 did not allow the sheer size of Popmart to eclipse the music. Songs like Pride (In the Name of Love), I Will Follow, Where the Streets Have No Name New Year's Day fulfilled all my expectations.

One of the most comical moments was when the Edge did his own version of Dana's All Kinds of Everything. Words were provided for the song by a giant 150-foot screen.

Write to media scope by posting your comments to Newspaper in the Classroom, The Irish Times, 11-16 D'Olier Street, Dublin 2 , or faxing them to (01) 679 2789.

Or you can use the Internet and e-mail us at mediapage@irishtimes.ie

media scope is edited by Harry Browne.