Committee	Standardised School Calendar	Christmas Fair
Meeting Minutes	Presentations

Welcome to the Parents Association Page

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National Parents Council Survey on Internet Safety

The National Parents Council (NPC) are currently running a survey on internet safety in advance of "Safer Internet Day".

Each year, around the world, Safer Internet Day is celebrated on the second day of the second week of the second month of the year; this year's Safer Internet Day will take place on Tuesday 7th February 2012.

The event is part of a global drive to promote a safer Internet for users of all ages. In Ireland the campaign is organised by the National Centre for Technology in Education (NCTE) and promoted through Webwise, the Internet Safety initiative of the NCTE.

The theme for Safer Internet Day 2012 is “Discovering the digital world together ….safely”.

The NPC would appreciate it if you could complete this survey. The survey can be accessed by clicking here.

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Survey Results

The survey was available from May 24^th to June 3^rd. A total of 85 people responded to the survey and the results are detailed on the following pages.

Notes on the survey:

· In question 1 the respondent had the option of selecting 1 or more answers so that is why the total number of answers to this question is greater than 85.

· For questions 3 and 4 the respondent could only select 1 answer for each question so the total of all answers for each question should come to 85.

· Questions 2 and 5 were optional questions. The responses have been copied directly from the survey and have not been edited in any way.

· Questions 6 and 7 gave the respondent the option to include their name and their e-mail address if they would like to be included in e-mails from the Parents Association. For obvious reasons, this information will not be included in this reportJ

Q1. What type of presentations would you be interested in attending?

· Parenting

· Child Psychology

· Preparation for Secondary School

· Nutrition

· Internet Security

· Other

Q1 Graph

Q2. If you selected "Other" in the above question, please enter some details here about the type of presentation you'd like to see.

· Bullying

· Simple homework and study skills. I believe its too late to show the kids how to study in secondary school

· Bullying. Confidence Building Child Personal Development

· Some type of anti-bullying presentation is always a good one to have every so often.

· Childrens mental well being Tackling bullying - teaching your child to cope with bullying. Raising confident children

· Anti bullying

· Sex education for boys - guidelines for parents

· Bullying and how to deal with it.

· talks on bullying

· perhaps a paediatric first aid evening or informative talks on Dyslexia or other learning difficulties - good for both teachers & parents alike.

· Maybe discussion on what's in the sex education programme - but I think we may be informed on that as standard. Maybe a talk on how religion is being taught now - bible based, feelings based - is there a structure......maybe I should try and answer that for my self first!!!

· Bullying; Fun family cooking;

· First Aid

· bullying in schools. Attended a fantastic lecture given by a guy from Trinity College in another school and attendance numbers were very high. A programme was then started with all the boys age relevant. Can get his name if it is of interest.

Q3. What day of the week would suit you best to attend a presentation?

· Monday

· Tuesday

· Wednesday

· Thursday

· Friday

Q3 chart

Q4. What time would suit you best to attend a presentation?

· 7:00 p.m.

· 7:30 p.m.

· 8:00 p.m.

· 8:30 p.m.

· 9:00 p.m.

Q4 Chart

Q5. If you have comments and / or suggestions about the Parents Association, please enter them here.

· I think the Parent Assoc is a very worthwhile association.

· Keep up the good work!

· I think they do a great job, maybe monthly meetings should be rotated. They are always on Wednesdays, which means if this day doesn't suit, you never have the opportunity to attend

· I would like to help more though I work outside the home and have a toddler (in addition to the 2 at school). Thank you for all you do for all of us and our kids and if I can help at all I 'll do my best

· Delighted that the minutes are now on the website as it is extremely difficult to make the monthly meeting and we all like to keep informed of the work going on behind the scenes. Many thanks to all the very hard work done by all on the parents association on behalf of my family.

· A thankless task! Thank you!

· The Parents Association do a fantastic job. Huge amount of time and commitment much appreciated by all the parents,

· Parents of new students should be give guidelines wrt gifts to teachers christmas/summer. Many parents are unclear as to weather or not this is expected of them, is it ok to opt out ! or go solo on a gift or how much should they contribute. I think that this is a very 'grey' area which can cause concern to new parents.

· Thanks for all the work you do on our behalf

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Newsletter

Dear Fellow Parents,

As the summer holidays loom, I would like to take this opportunity to give you a brief update on the Parents' Association and its various activities this year.

Many thanks to all of you who have actively participated in and helped with the various activities during the year such as The Christmas Fair, The Junior Infant Evenings, 6th Class Graduations and The Confirmation & First Holy Communion Teas.

In particular, I would like to thank those of you who have volunteered to be the Class Representatives in your respective classes. Although still in its infancy, this new venture is proving to be a great success. Some classes still do not have Class Reps so if you are interested in getting involved, please contact me. If you are not a class rep please remember that you are more than welcome to attend the monthly meetings.

In an effort to raise the profile of the Parents' Association, we have decided to put the minutes of the monthly meetings up on the school websites for your perusal. We hope that this will keep everyone informed of what is happening, even if you can't make the meetings.

The Educational Committee have organised many varied and interesting talks over the years e.g. Secondary School information evenings, Healthy Lunch information and Internet Safety. While the attendance at these presentations has been good, we would expect that given the number of parents between both schools that the attendance should be better. This was discussed at a recent monthly meeting and it was decided to ask parents for their input and see what sort of talks they would be interested in attending and what day and time would suit best to stage these talks. We have set up an on-line survey and would appreciate if you could take 5 minutes to fill this out. The survey can be accessed from the Parents Association pages on both schools web sites.

To access the survey from the Boys School site

1. Log on to http://www.stbrigids.ie

2. From the About menu, click Parents Association.

3. You will see a link to the survey on this page.

To access the survey from the Girls School site:

1. Log on to http://www.stbrigidsgirlsschool.com

2. From the menu on the left hand side of the screen, click on Parents Association

3. You will see a link to the survey on this page.

The survey will be available until Friday June 3^rd so please take the time to fill this in before then.

I would like to personally thank Pauline and Elaine, our school secretaries, for their huge help and constant cooperation with our on-going activities. I am very conscious that all they do for us is in addition to their own considerable workload. Many thanks also to Mr. O’Connell and Mrs. Sweeney for their continued support of the Association.

Finally, to those parents whose children are finishing in the schools this year, I hope you’ve found the Parents Association to be of use to you during your child’s time in the school. Remember, the Christmas Fair will be on Sunday November 27th and I look forward to see you all returning to support it:-). To the rest of the parents, I wish you all a happy, sunny and restful summer holiday and look forward to seeing you all in September.

Joanna Ross.

Chairperson Parents Association.

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Join our e-mail distribution list

If you would like to be kept informed of upcoming meetings, educational talks, social events etc, click here to send a mail and join the distribution list.

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"CLASS CUISINE" book launch

December Update

If you're looking for a last minute Christmas gift, how about a "Class Cuisine" cookbook? They're only €10 each and would make an ideal stocking filler. If you'd like a copy, you can contact any member of the Parents Association Committee or drop us an e-mail and we'll be in contact with you.

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The Girls School hall was full to capacity for the launch of our "Class Cuisine" cook book by RTE's Miriam O'Callaghan. Pupils, parents and grandparents were present for this most anticipated launch.

If you were unable to attend the launch, you can click here to view a video of Miriam's speech.

The launch was also covered by the Irish Independent.

The books sold like "hot cakes" on the night but there are still some available from the following:

Trentuno, Cabinteely
Hilton Pharmacy, Cornelscourt
Spar at The Park
Lazy Days Coffee Shop , 11 Sydney Terrace , Blackrock
Lilliput Creche

Copies can also be ordered by e-mailing stbrigidsrecipebook@yahoo.co.uk .

UPDATE: As of June 1st, there's less than 10 books available. These will be on sale at the upcoming Garden Day, so get there early and pick up your copy!!

Here are some pictures from the event

Many thanks to Paul Sherwood (www.sherwood.ie) and Kay Cadogan for providing the pictures.

Pippa Quigley, Miriam O'Callaghan, Catherine Murphy & Ger Corcoran.