PTA / Coiste na dTuismitheoirí-Múinteoirí
About Us, Who's Who, Events, Minutes.

Dear Parents/Guardians,
With the end of another school year approaching the PTA would like to thank you all for your help and support during the year. We would like to give a breakdown of the events that happened during the year and some ideas we have for next year.
So as to be clear about everything we will break this down into 2 separate items non fundraising events and fundraising events.

Non Fundraising Events
Coffee Morning - We feel our coffee mornings held on the 1st Wednesday each month are a great success. Parents get to meet and have a chat over a morning tea/coffee. If you have not attended one of these please try and drop in, the more the merrier.

School Book Club – The coincides with our coffee morning and is a great way for parents to save a little each month towards the school books. This will be running again in September. School books will be on sale on the 17th/18th of June, in the hall.

Healthy Eating Weeks – We had 2 healthy eating weeks this year were the children were encouraged to try different fruit and vegetables as well as encouraging them to bring in a healthy lunch. The fruit and vegetable platters were prepared freshly each morning by the PTA members. We hope to have a number of these next year.

Clean Up Day – We had one clean up day during the year and a number of parents turned up to this. The school grounds were tidied and benches around the school were painted. We would like to thank Frank the caretaker for continuing to keep the school grounds looking so well.

Insurance Scheme - We set up the voluntary insurance scheme for parents to join for their children – this will be renewed again in September.

School Photos – We arranged a photographer to come into the school to take photos of the children. A number of parents purchased these photos. We hope this may become a yearly event.

T-Shirts for Santry – We organized the t-shirts for the students running at Santry. These t-shirts will be kept in the school for future years.

Text a Parent – We have managed to secure this system and hope to have it set up by September, this is were we will have a number for every parent in the school and will be able to text them for certain events, early closing and school closures (eg heating broken, bad weather conditions).

Spare Change Friday - As the name suggests it involves the children bringing in their spare change, but this money is for the student council to decide what they want to use it for, some have mentioned a school garden where the children can plant some shrubs and vegetables.

Optional School Tracksuit – The optional school tracksuit is something that a lot of parents have purchased. The suppliers will be coming to the school on Thursday 10th June from 1.00pm to 3.00pm, so if you want to purchase the optional tracksuit please come along then.

Sports Day - The sports day this year is again divided into two. The seniors on the 22nd and juniors on the 23rd June. Members of the PTA help out on these days but as always any parent who has some spare time is more than welcome to come along and help out. This year we are hoping to organize some platters of fruit for the children throughout the day.

Jungle Dave – This has become a yearly event which the children love. Jungle Dave brings in some reptiles for the children to see and learn about. He will be coming in on the Monday 28th June.

Graduation Night – As the school is growing and our 6th class are moving on, this is our 2nd year to have a graduation night. The PTA help out on the night with teas/coffees etc and this year we have also got involved in the preparation of the event . (Organizing t- shirts, pens and year end books, for the students to take away with them as a reminder of their time at Griffeen Valley) This year our 6th class will have their graduation on 24th June.

Fundraising Events
Pub Quiz - In October 2009 we held our pub quiz in Lucan Sarsfield. As always this was a great night and we raised 820.00. We will hopefully hold another quiz some time next year.

School Calendar and Christmas Raffle – We had the school colander for sale back in November 09 were members of the PTA went around the classes and took photographs of each class, these in turn were sent to the printers to produce our yearly colander. We also had our Christmas raffle in December. both of these events raised 7,000 for the school.

Easter Raffle and Bake Sale – On Friday 26th March we held a raffle and bake sale, some of the children helped out with this and again raised 620.00 for the school.

Student Sponsored Walk – All students received a sponsorship card and completed their walk between the 17th and 21st May. The amount raised this year was 3,477.

Food Fair – The food fair is a yearly event which is taking place on the 11th of June this year. The PTA help out with this event every year and to date it has been a huge success, so if you have never been to one of our food fairs, why not make this year a first. Tickets are on sale at the moment.

All money raised this year is going to purchase white interactive boards for ALL classrooms . From September we hope to have each class from junior infants to 6th class fitted with an interactive board. It was a huge aim for the school and thanks to everyone we have achieved this. If anyone would like to see how these boards work please contact a PTA member and we will arrange this.

As you can see from the above we really focused on raising the funds for our white interactive boards, having achieved this going forward we hope to concentrate on support for the parents of the school, along with some fundraising.
Some of the ideas we have are:
Courses for Parents eg. First Aid, Parenting etc
A non fundraising social night maybe around Christmas/Easter
A monthly drop in were parents can speak to a PTA member should they have any ideas/comments to make.
These are just some of the ideas we hope to implement but as always need to know what you the parents want. If you have any ideas please do not hesitate to contact one of the PTA members.
Once again thank you for your support and we hope everyone has a great summer.

THE PTA