Week 4 info: Diwali, Covid-19, Disco and Pool Party, construction works
Tēnā koutou katoa,
COVID-19 Update:
I have received an update from the Secretary for Education late this afternoon:
The Government continues to take a precautionary approach and has encouraged workers in the CBD in Auckland to work at home tomorrow if possible. If you need to go into the Auckland CBD tomorrow, please wear a face covering and practice physical distancing.
Schools remain safe and are expected to be open tomorrow.
Diwali Festival
Diwali, also known as Deepavali, or the Festival of Lights, signifies the triumph of light over darkness, good over evil, and renewal of life. Millions of Hindus around the world, including those in New Zealand, celebrate Diwali with gifts, lights, fireworks, and special meals. Major public festivals, along with private and family celebrations, mark Diwali in New Zealand. Manor Pillay, Programme Manager of sKids, has kindly lent the teaching staff beautiful saris to wear so we can celebrate Diwali tomorrow at school. It will be a very colourful day!
PTA School Disco and PTA Pool Party
There is great excitement in the school today...with one more sleep to the school disco! A big thank you to the PTA for organising this event for the children. I look forward to everyone getting their dancing shoes on and boogieing the night away at this fun school event!
The PTA Pool Party is on the 4th December, the theme is a Kiwiana Beach Pool Party. The party will start at 3.00 pm with the pool closing at 6.00 pm. The PTA have lots of fun activities planned but they really need some volunteers to make this event run smoothly. Even if it's just for an hour. I have attached a sign-up sheet if you are able to volunteer. If you have problems with the link, let me know and I can add you to the list.
And the pool is opening soon for the community!
I am delighted that Sports Waitakere will continue to work with our school on the community access scheme “West Auckland Open Up”. This project provides funding to enable the wider community to use school facilities, e.g. swimming pools, outside of school hours.
I am delighted that we can open the pool to the school community from Monday 23rd November. We have two pool attendants raring to go!
The school pool is available for use at the following times:
Monday – Friday: 3.00 pm–6.00 pm
Weekends and holidays: 12.00 pm–6.00 pm
Running a school pool is extremely costly so the school will operate a concession card system to help fund the use of chemicals etc. The concession card will be checked by the pool attendants on entry.
· The concession card is $20.50. $2 for every swimmer. Buy 10 and 11th entry is free. 50c admin charge included
· Concession cards can be purchased through Kindo (from Monday 13th November) and picked up at the office
Spectators enter for free and please note strictly no cash can be taken by the pool attendants.
I have attached the School Pool Use contract so you can see all the rules that need to be followed and that you will agree to when you buy your card through Kindo.
Demolition: Saturday 14th November
The old fire escape at the back of the school from Room 10 and the staffroom is being demolition over the weekend. I ask the school community to be mindful if you or the family plan to enter the school grounds over the weekend. My recommendation is that unsupervised children and teenagers should stay off-site.
There are lots of articles in this newsletter with a range of information - I encourage you to read it carefully and welcome questions or feedback.
Ngā mihi
Julie