Thank You

We have been overwhelmed this year by the resounding response to the Voluntary Contribution Appeal and the remarkable support of the Elfpedition. We once again shout out a massive THANK YOU to all our supporters and cheerleaders – our parents, our pupils, our teachers and administration team, our sponsors, local businesses and members of our community. The strides we have made this year enhancing our children’s education and environment would not have been possible without all of you.

Our school is fortunate to have an amazing team of teachers and volunteers who give so graciously of their time to support and improve the learning experience for the children – our wonderful Parents Association, the imaginative and magical team behind the Elfpedition, our green fingered Garden Committee, our environmentally aware and planet conscious Green Committee, our terrific Traffic Management Committee and our parent volunteers who support these committees and other initiatives such as the successful Book Fair.

Making Fundraising Fun and Accessible!

This year restricted by Covid rules we took our fundraising efforts into the virtual space and for our first year raising in this space the results were astounding! Each of our fundraising initiatives were led by a small team and supported by our Parents Association, which includes a wonderful team of Class Reps.

Your generous support helped us to make some significant improvements to the school’s infrastructure and hardware to future-proof classroom learning and support your child’s learning and enjoyment of school.

€16,000 of funds raised went to upgrading the school’s internal network and WIFI. As the school is an old building, there were many ‘dead’ zones without WiFi or broadband access, limiting online learning aids and teaching tools for our pupils. The network upgrade means that now, all classrooms are connected to the internet, and all pupils can benefit from the learning opportunities this presents, utilising additional support and online learning tools for children who need a little bit of extra help. One significant additional advantage of this network upgrade we have all benefited from this year was that parent-teacher meetings could take place via Zoom this year, something we have received very positive feedback on.

A further €22,000 was used to upgrade the classroom hardware. The ageing classroom PCs were running on Windows 2007/2010, many of the machines were well over 10 years old, making it difficult to provide quality interactive engagement in a rapidly digitalising world. The IT hardware upgrades enable the children to engage with technology every day, enjoying the now more fluid interactive and blended learning environment.

The school has invested €16,000 in new interactive screens. These screens engage pupils’ different learning styles whether visual, auditory or kinaesthetic, allowing pupils to engage with lessons in new ways with is supportive of their individual needs. Screen-mirroring features allow students to share work with their peers in real-time. This allows for the all-important social interaction and collaboration between class and year-groups, which would not otherwise be possible with the current Covid-19 restrictions. Currently, these screens are used by 5th and 6th class students to enable them to strengthen that bond with their peers in a year that they all envisaged so differently, and help them to form lasting connections.

Over the next year in collaboration with the school IT committee we would like to extend this incredible initiative so all pupils can benefit from this new way of interacting, and with your help we hope to introduce these interactive screens to all classes.

Communication boards have been introduced to the school and the yards. These boards enable children with communication difficulties to communicate easier with their classmates and teachers. We are proud to be an inclusive school and the communication boards are a fantastic inclusive resource for the school and all its students.

An improvement in communication was long overdue, and with the implementation of Aladdin Connect we are confident that the daily interactions between the school and parents and guardians is going to benefit immensely.

As you will have noticed, this year all the year-end reports have been sent out via Aladdin, saving not only on administration costs but also reduce the school’s use of paper and thus improve our ‘green’ credentials.

Many of you have already registered to Aladdin Connect, so you are able to receive messages from the school and access your children’s details. Thank you to all early adopters! If you have not yet signed up, contact the school to receive your code.

School Website

Thank you to the School Website team for creating a vibrant informative site.

An Oasis in Glasthule

Our dedicated and hardworking Garden Committee, together with a team of parent volunteers, spent their Easter holidays making the school garden an oasis of visual, sensory and tactile experiences for the children. We are fortunate to have such a calm and peaceful place for teachers and their classes to take outdoor lessons.

Guided Reading Library

The funds raised by the School Book Fair supported the acquisition of a new Guided Reading Library and a supply of books for the in-class libraries. A Guided Reading system supports the teachers’ comprehensive and integrated approach for developing young readers interest and ability to read.

Be Safe, Be Green, Be Seen

Through a tireless and dedicated collaborative approach by our Traffic Management Committee, PA and the school we were successful in securing additional bike racks in both the school grounds and across in Eden park. DLR once again partnered with us and provided high vis vests and safety gear for the children to ensure safe travel to and from school. The introduction of the walking bus routes has been well received with many children choosing this mode of transport. Thank you to the parents who volunteer to supervise their safe daily commute. A significant addition to the safety of the children is the accessible gate beside the pedestrian crossing. The lobbying to secure this has paid dividends and the children can enter and exit the park safely. The Safe Routes to School (SRTS) Programme launched in 2021 and was open to all schools in Ireland. 932 schools applied but only 170 were chosen for the initial round. We are thrilled that the Harold school was one of the successful applicants!

Thank you to our amazing and dedicated Lollypop lady for keeping our children safe crossing the road.

Sign Off

With the easing of restrictions, the roll-out of the vaccine and a summer in front of us the future feels bright. We look forward to welcoming you all back in September 2021 for another successful school year, where we will continue to strive to enhance our children’s learning environment with future developments.

We wish to all a safe, sunny and fun summer.