FESTIVE FUN FOR ALL

Christmas Fair 2011

A fantastic Christmas fair raised £5,100, with an additional £1,800 from Aspire Estate Agents, whose boards promoted the fair. Well done Janneke Diemel for organising the event with invaluable support from Sarah Hill, Christine Witty and Joanna Key for the rota, Year 6 helpers in particular Alexandra Diemel, Liz Pleasance for the raffle, Victor football Santa, Sarah Dowley for the grotto, Becs De Boehmler and Leina OKeefe for grotto set up - it looked fantastic! and many many more!

And thank you to all the families who came along to support it.

Shop 'til you drop - Christmas Shopping Evening

On 24 November Christmas came to Ravenstone at the very successful Christmas Shopping Evening. Virginie Trinder, Penny Roughton and Juliet Milward all did a fantastic job in organising the event. After arriving to a candle lit entrance, a fairy light strewn peace garden and a busking saxophonist, the hall and nursery were filled with an array of gift stalls ranging from chocolates, and jewellery, to toys and stationery.

Along with complimentary mince pies and mulled wine there was also a chance for some pampering especially from Julies nails in Balham who very generously donated all their takings to Ravenstone. Including an impressive raffle, the event raised £1,542 in total for the school.

Taking care of the pennies

Every bit as significant as the big events are those creative money making initiatives that top up the PTA coffers! Thank you to Diccon and Caroline Beeny for the autumn tea raising 246. Well done to Sue Sutton Smith for producing the new school calendar. £740 was raised selling them at the Christmas fair and they're still on sale now see below.

As well as raising money, the PTA also offers Ravenstone families invaluable services: Sophie Nazir organised the sale of Christmas trees; and Nora Moller has relaunched the Abel and Cole sale of organic fruit and veg.

Spending the PTA pennies

Your incredible generosity and the tireless work of PTA stalwarts and newcomers means that we do raise substantial sums of money. We then have the unenviable task of spending it wisely. Guided by Alan Millington and other teachers at the school, PTA money is going towards a class set of netbook computers for key stage one as well as laptop trollies that allow for charging, safe storage and mobility. The new paths in the back playground were partly funded by PTA money. Thanks to you all for your efforts to benefit all the children.

GHANA DAY ON YOU TUBE!

The Ghana party on 18 November not only raised awareness, but also an amazing 767.99 which will go towards equipping the emergency room in the Afrikids-Yameriga Medical Centre in Bolgatangpa, northern Ghana. See twelve minutes of marching in the playground and singing in the evening, on You Tube - click below

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1DUtIs2qZAw

SCHOOL WEBSITE

The PTA section of the website is constantly updated to reflect news, events and other relevant PTA information. So look regularly and keep your finger on the PTA pulse! If you have any ideas for additional content that you would like to see on the PTA section of the site, please tell Matt Barker.

EVENTS COMING UP THIS EASTER TERM

Next PTA Meeting: Wednesday 11th January at 8 pm

Childrens Disco: Friday 24 February after school

Parents Disco: Friday 20th January at 8pm

Spring Tea: date tbc

Have you bought your school 2012 calendar yet? Times running out! They are on sale at the Christmas Shows or directly from Sue Sutton Smith
on 07957 442257.

The PTA for EVERYONE

At the last Parent Teachers Association meeting Alan Millington reminded us that there are 35 different languages spoken at Ravenstone with the most common being Urdu, Somali and Polish. We have been having quite a few conversations about making sure everyone feels they can be a part of the PTA.

We came up with some brilliant ideas. One of the best was to set up a network of link persons to represent each of the 35 languages. This might not involve much work. The link person would be the parent contact for the group of people that speak their language. It might mean doing some buddying when someone new arrives at school. This might just be saying hello or helping explain/translate a book bag flyer. Because we don't want to overburden anyone, ideally it would be someone who has not already got a role in the PTA. We have already got some volunteers- Turkish and Bulgarian link roles have been snapped up. We know everyone is incredibly busy over Christmas, so were going to really start on this in the New Year.

Think about it and please step forward if it sounds like you. Or if not and you think someone else might be good, why don't you ask them to contact us, class reps or any other PTA regulars.