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"I am always totally overwhelmed by the support and dedication of the PTA members. They not only provide us with exciting social events, but also raise funds which help to give the children such an enjoyable education, through new resources. Their contribution to the school community provides a collective of professional skills, innovation and new ideas, creativity and collaborative working practices. Not everyone needs a special talent, just a willingness to try a new skill!" Mr C.D. Harrison - Head teacher |
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PTA Elected Officers Chairperson: What the children say: ‘The Film Night was cool – dressing like stars was amazing - I felt very glamorous!’
Sponsored Bounce 2007 Last years sponsored bounce took place on Friday 23rd March, to raise money for our schools playground.
With the monies raised from this years sponsored bounce we are hoping to reinstate all of our outdoor equipment including the expansion of new shelters and adventure equipment.
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Why Do We Have A PTA? We are very fortunate at our school to have a PTA that is and has been such an integral part of the school community for a number of years. In its time the PTA has raised many thousands of pounds, which have been spent on improving equipment and resources to enhance our children’s education and the facilities in school in general. But it is much, much more than just fundraising. The PTA exists to provide closer links between home and school, and it is an excellent way to bring staff, parents and friends together socially in support of the school working towards a common goal. And it’s fun! Just ask any of the PTA Committee or helpers. Obviously as in any organisation, there are times when it is more ‘challenging’, but with the continued support of parents and staff, our PTA has always succeeded in its efforts. All parents and members of the school community can get involved if they want to, even if they only have a small amount of time available, and all parents are automatically members of the Association when they join our school. The PTA is extremely conscious of the ethos and morals of our school, and we try very hard when organising and planning events to respect this. Not all of our events are run as fundraisers. The Santa’s Breakfast and Film Nights that we have held are done for the kids and not necessarily to raise money. Our aim is that all our events are fun for those involved. The discos in particular are run with the aim of giving the children a good time and when you hear the noise you will know that that is the case!! We are a Registered Charity The Charities Act 1993 requires organisations such as ours with an annual income in excess of £1,000 to register with the Charity Commission. Being a Registered Charity gives us many extra benefits. - We are able to apply for Gift Aid, which can earn us an extra 28.2p in every pound donated to the PTA. - We can raise funds more easily from grant giving trusts, local businesses etc. - We can take advantage of charity matched giving schemes Our charity number is 1108764 How We Raise Money As in most schools, the majority of our funds are raised through the events that we run. Some of our most popular events are the Discos – separate discos for KS1 and KS2 once every half term which are great fun and very noisy. Kids really do dress to impress. Again if you check it out with parents of children at other schools the answer is normally that they do not have as many discos as us. Christmas Fair – this has really developed in recent years and has grown each time. The children come round the stalls first and parents join in the fun at the end of the school day. Lots of Christmas goodies and fun. Get ready to make your Christmas Cracker!! Santa’s Breakfast – especially for KS1 children on a Saturday morning. KS2 Christmas event – These have been film nights in 2005 and 2006 which have been extremely successful. Dressed like stars and posing on the red carpet for the paparazzi. Sponsored Events – sponsored bounces are always fun. Bag 2 School – an organisation that we have had worked with a number of times already whereby the kids bring home a blue bag to be filled with good quality second hand clothes etc which are ten sold to emerging nations. We get money based on the total weight of the bag collection. So you can see, there is always something going on! The true icing on the cake is to see the children having fun at the events or enjoying using a piece of new equipment that the PTA has donated. We are fortunate however to have other opportunities open to us to raise money. Donations are extremely important. These can be time, money, items for sale, donations for raffles or offers of services and skills etc. As our PTA is a Registered Charity, we are able to raise money through Gift Aid and Charity Matching Schemes. Charity Matched Giving Charity matching is a very simple practice. Companies or businesses pledge to donate to a charity such as ourselves an amount of money relating to the amount that an employee(s) donates or fundraises for us. We have been helped enormously in the past by this type of donation, and there are several benefits to both ourselves and the company involved. Employees’ morale is boosted by having their efforts supported by their employer. The company benefits from having charitable donations written off against taxable profits. The company can endeavour to get publicity for their giving. Our PTA benefits from receiving perhaps double what we have raised at an event. If you think that your employer has a matched giving scheme already in operation, or if you would like some more information about charity matching or setting up a scheme in your workplace, please talk to one of the PTA officers, or ask in the school office. How We Spend The Money You Raise As quickly as possible! Once money is raised from events the funds are banked straight away. There is not normally any advantage in keeping the money in the bank and at each committee meeting any requests for funding are raised. In the normal course of events, Mr Harrison or Mrs Leask will have a ‘shopping list’ of items that the school would like to purchase. Sometimes this will be as a result of the children asking for something for the class room or playground. At other times it will be for resources to improve a particular area of the curriculum or school environment. In the main the PTA funds are for the ‘extras’ not provided by the school budget, that make our children’s learning experiences so much more fulfilling and exciting. We always endeavour to spend our funds in ways that will benefit all our children across all areas of the school. Of course there are times when we have a big project underway that we need to save money for. The biggest example of this was that in the school year 2004/5 we agreed to target raising money to buy new furniture for all of the classrooms and contribute to redecoration so that following the opening of the school extension all classes would have the same level of environment. Over £20000 was committed to the school for this which was a phenomenal achievement. The PTA does have ongoing commitments every year such as We pay for dictionaries presented to Year 6 children at their leavers’ assembly. We provide a sum of money for each class at Christmas How Can You Get Involved There are lots of ways you can help and support your child through the PTA. Offering to help before and at events, or at other times during the year is so valuable – it really is a case of ‘many hands make light work’. It doesn’t matter if you can’t help on a regular basis, or even if you can’t come into school. There are always little jobs that can be done from home if you have half an hour to spare e.g. wrapping gifts, preparing raffle tickets etc. We really couldn’t achieve what we do without the unseen ‘army of help’ that exists in school. You can of course if you feel able, to be a Committee Member. You can attend the AGM and give us your ideas for fundraising events – this is also the time to ask questions or voice your opinion. You can help by letting us know if you have any contacts or skills we could use – anything is valuable to us. And finally, we are always extremely grateful to receive donations as mentioned before. Links With Local Business We have, over time, looked to develop strong links with the local community and are always well supported by both residents and businesses, for which we are very grateful. Many of our local shops are very generous in their donations of raffle prizes etc. This is an area we want to build even further in the future as we believe that this will have a huge impact on our fundraising. Role Of The Committee Our PTA Committee consists of 4 elected Officers (Chair, Vice-Chair, Treasurer and Secretary). We also have between 4 and 8 other Committee members to make up the full Committee. The Committee meet on a regular basis usually once a month, with smaller working groups meeting as necessary to organise our bigger events. Annual General Meeting (AGM) Our Annual General Meeting is held during the autumn term, and this is an opportunity for all parents to come along and hear in more detail about events run and funds raised, and how the money has been spent. It is also the occasion when we elect our new Committee. Support from NCPTA (National Confederation of Parent Teacher Associations) NCPTA also has a range of parental information sheets on subjects such as: literacy and numeracy, special educational needs, how to help your child get the most out of their school days, bullying, homework, using the internet and career paths to name but a few. You can access this information via the NCPTA website, www.ncpta.org.uk To gain entry to the site you will need our membership number, which is 15378 and our school postcode which is B62 OBZ. Do have a look. Richard Brooks, Chairperson |
