It is hard to believe that we have already come to the end of the year. If you have time over the holidays I’d like you to take a look back at the news section of this blog which will give you a flavour of the year here at Lucan East. There have been so many successes from the macro to the micro. Every day we come together as a community. Sometimes we focus on big projects which foster our sense of community. These include our active school week which resulted in our active flag being awarded or our intercultural week, school garden, sports teams, Science award and Seachtain na Gaeilge (Irish Language week). We have also opened a second class in our outreach for children with Autism. The children in Ghana class have made a great start in our school and have enriched the lives of our entire community.
Equally as important as these big projects are the smaller interactions that teachers, parents and students make each day. This year the teaching staff have worked to refine how we teach literacy and numeracy in the school. We have looked at how we assess our students work and how we conference and give feedback to our students. It is during this conferencing and feedback and discussion that occurs on a regular basis in all parts of the school every day that the real magic of education takes place.
This year we bid farewell to China class who will graduate on Thursday evening. We are so proud of them and their many achievements. It has been a privilege to be part of their journey in primary school. I would like to thank their families who have been a pleasure to work with and have played their part in shaping these wonderful young people. The art project completed by China class will be a reminder to us all of their life in the school. The motto “look at the stars see how they shine for you” form the inspiration for the project which can be seen at the entrance to the outreach. It illustrates the sense of community that exists between the oldest and newest students. We also say goodbye to Alan F., Mary and Jane who were great additions to our teaching staff this year. I would like to thank them for their contribution and wish them well in the future. We will remember them fondly. We also say goodbye to Orla who worked in China class as an SNA and thank her for all her work.
I would like to thank Lesley who works tirelessly to ensure that the school runs smoothly and efficiently. Her interactions with all the children and adults epitimises our ethos as an Educate Together School. You will all have received your school reports through our new parent portal. This has been a great addition to how we interact with families in the school and along with our online payments aims to support parents in the accessing of information and services within the school. Lesley has been a great support to everybody as we roll this service out.
This year has been a groundbreaking one for Educate Together Schools in Lucan as we embark on our new common enrolment policy which we hope will ensure more transparency and fairness in the the enrolment process. This partnership comes at the end of five years of work from all the boards of Management. This work is undertaken entirely on a voluntary basis which involves many meetings on cold winter evenings. It is the volunteers who support our school on our board, PTA and in the wider Educate Together family that are the real heroes of our community.
Finally I would like to thank my amazing colleagues who put children at the centre of everything we do. The amazing children who make the school what it is and make it a pleasure to come to work every day. I would like to wish you all a safe and peaceful summer and look forward to us all returning to write the next chapter in the story of our school together for the 2015/2016 school year.