Welcome back

Welcome back to the summer term.  Hopefully, everyone has had a lovely break and had the opportunity to enjoy the good weather.

It is especially nice to return to some very good news.

Congratulations

We were delighted to hear of the safe arrival of baby Casey during the Easter holidays.  We send congratulations to Jillian and Jacob and to Ryan, who is already enjoying helping with his baby brother.

Green Flag

We were also delighted to receive a letter on Tuesday informing us that our application for our third Green Flag has been successful.  Some of the Green School Committee members will now travel to Letterkenny to collect our flag at an award ceremony and we will be celebrating with the rest of the school community at our own school event later in the term. 

School Tours

Both school tours have now been organised.

3rd - 6th Class will travel to Omagh Folk Park on Thursday 29th May.
Junior Infants - 2nd Class will be visiting Woodville Farm in Sligo and then stopping at Five Star Fun in Grange on the journey home on Wednesday 28th May.

Further details to follow shortly.

Writer's Visit

To continue our work on writing as part of our School Self-Improvement Plan, we look forward to welcoming Liz Weir to school on Thursday 8th May.  She will be working with all classes.

And the not very good news...! 

Test Week is almost upon us once more.  Thank you all very much for your support of this in the past few years.  Again this year, we would very much appreciate it if you could try to avoid any absences or morning appointments from Tuesday 20th May until Thursday 29th May as we will be carrying out our annual Standardised Tests.  It is not always possible to reschedule tests and even if time permits, asking a child to sit a test alone can be a stressful experience for him or her.

Thank you...and thank you

We would like to thank Jenny Mahon for visiting us in school just before the Easter holidays and helping the children decorate their Easter buns.  

We would also like to thank Corrie Crawford for her help in the Infant room over the past couple of months.

End of Year Show

I am finding it difficult to believe that I am writing about the End of Year Show as it seems like we have just held the last one!  This year's End of Year Show will be held on Thursday 19th June at 7 p.m. I am not a football fan but I sincerely hope this is not clashing with any important World Cup match.  

We send our warmest congratulations and best wishes to Mrs Patterson and her husband Richard. We look forward to the safe arrival of baby Patterson in autumn.

Daffodils!

This is probably a very appropriate time to thank Mr Barnett for his continued work in our garden.  We are especially thankful for the fantastic display of spring flowers in the school grounds.
Thank you also to those responsible for planting and maintaining the flowers in our pots at the school entrance.  

Uniform Survey

The Board of Management met last Tuesday and considered the results of the recent Uniform Survey. The results of the survey can be found in the Parents' Section of the website or by clicking here.

Book Fair

Thank you for your support of the Book Fair last week.  A total of €1039 euro was spent on books and a further €554 was received for orders of our 'We are Writers' Book.

The school receives 60% of this amount in commission to spend on books

This means we are now able to spend a total of €955 on books for the class libraries.  We are also hoping to set up a library area in the school entrance hall in the next few months so will be able to begin buying some new books for this.

We thank Mrs Geraghty for organising the Book Fair and 6th Class for giving up their breaks last week to deal with all the customers!

The 'We are Writers' books have now been ordered and hopefully will be with us before Easter.  I know there are lots of proud children eagerly waiting to show off their work.

Fundraising Dance

Please could we have all ticket money returned as soon as possible.  The P.T.A. and I were disappointed that more of our families were not represented last Thursday evening.  I hope that if you were unable to come to the Dance, you will show your support through your ticket sales and will also join me in thanking the members of the P.T.A. for their work on behalf of all the children in school.

It is unfortunate that our Department of Education Grants are now not enough to meet the school's running costs.  We work very hard in school to try to give the children as many opportunities and as much access to new equipment/resources as children in other schools.

It is becoming increasingly difficult to continue doing that. 

Thank you

Thank you Jenny and Alan for bringing in some very cute lambs last week.  There are pictures in the Gallery.

Easter Holidays

School will finish on Friday 11th April and will open again on Monday 28th April.

Anti-Bullying Policy

We are currently in the process of drafting a new Anti-Bullying Policy.  The draft version can be found in the Parents' Section of the website.  You can also ask for a copy in the school office.  To save money, we will not be printing copies for each family.

Comments and suggestions are very welcome.  You are also very welcome to come in and discuss any aspect of the policy with us.

Stay Safe

As part of the Social, Personal and Health Education Curriculum, the children will be covering lessons from the Stay Safe Programme over the next few weeks.  This programme covers topics such as personal safety and bullying.  The content of lessons and themes can be found here on the Stay Safe website.  You are very welcome to contact us if you would like to discuss these lessons.