March Minutes
St Michaels PTA
Minutes of the Meeting held Tuesday 13th March 2007 at 7.00pm
Present: Rachel Day, Sue Branton, Gina Dagger, Jacqui Bath, Susan Weaver, Ingrid Wilkins, Mel Kayes, Adrian Vye, Ruby Raja, Aruna Mistry, Michael Moreno, Nikki Goodway, Sue Brookes.
Apologies: Marina Moreno, Gaynor Brockwell, Deb Gooding, Casey Abram-Jones, Eugene James.
Jacqui welcomed all to the meeting and introduced Nikki as this was her first meeting.
The minutes of the last meeting were reread. The only matter arising was the Yellow Moon money. Ingrid advised that the catalogues raised £87 and a cheque will be arriving any minute. The minutes were agreed.
Correspondance: Just a PTA newsletter which talks about claiming Gift Aid as we are a registered charity. Gina will look into this to see if worth doing and report back at the next meeting.
Ladies Night/Pamper Evening
The evening was a great success ? a lot of hard work went into organizing the event. Mel thanked all who helped (Gaynor, Sue, Ingrid, Deb, Jacqui, Gina, Susan Weaver) and lots of others who gave their help on the night. It was estimated that we raised between £600-£750. This was fantastic and more than we had hoped.
Post Mortem
It would be better next time to have the event on a Friday.
People were asking for a Chocolate Stall
Have a clause next time for therapists to offer the next session free if they overrun on a session. Some therapists were running over and this was having a knock on effect and causing problems.
Do not invite Handbags 4 U
Do not invite Shoes to Suit U
Do not invite Pint Sized People
Lyn Hubbard donated £40 plus the £10 she paid for the table to the school which was very generous. The PTA should write and thank her for her generosity and offer her a free table next time. Gina will do this.
Parking ? we did not give this any thought and consequently the roads outside were chaos which did upset some of our neighbours. Next time we need to put cones out along Linden Close at least and organize some parking attendants. Although neighbours had a leaflet advertising the event next time we should write to them specifically telling them an event is taking place. Maybe we could use the Ridings Bus Car Park and people could walk through the lane for the next big event.
Some of the therapists (massage) in particular could have done with more screens to have made things more private.
Michael said he wished to raise the fact that Marina was upset that she had not been included as a therapist at the event. She is qualified to do many of the therapies that we had on offer. Also it had been her idea to have a pamper evening when she attended her first PTA meeting back last September.
Mel said that the Pamper Evening had been planned before last September and she had always intended to organize with Sue & Gaynor because they had experience of the one done at the Crossbow. Mel wasn't aware that Marina would have liked to be involved and Marina had not approached Mel to ask for a therapist's space. We had many therapists and stall holders keen to be involved. Michael confirmed that Marina would like to be included if we decide to hold a similar event in the future.
Pre School Easter Egg Hunt 28th March
Ingrid Gina and Deb to organize Tea and Coffee, Biscuits and Squash for the Pre School Easter Egg Hunt. Miss Weaver to organize the actual event and get the Eggs.
Easter Egg Hunt 4th April.
Gina to get letter out advertising the Easter Egg Hunt on the 20th March.
Yr 6 letters need to go out on the 26th March as they are away the week before.
Tickets will be £1.50 each. Gina will produce.
Aruna will call Cost Co to see how much they will do us 200 Eggs for. Sue will ring the Cash & Carry in Avonmouth to see what price she can get. If no real discount Sainsburys have a good offer on at the minute. Sue and Aruna will liase with Rachel who will organize buying the eggs. Note that we need 4 nut free and 1 dairy free (Isabelle Gooding)
We will not have a bouncy castle this year, but will have a sweet stall, Tea and Coffee and cold Drinks on sale.
Mr Vye will buy Ice Lollies to sell at the event.
Yr 3/4 disco.
Letters to go our on Monday 2nd April advertising the event. Each child will be asked to bring in a baby photo with their name on the back to go on the wall in a Year Book style. Time of event will be 4-6pm. Letter will advise parents that they are welcome to come in and help children change for the party but then they must leave. PTA and school will organise supervisors for the event.
We will go with an American Style disco and Games. Sue Branton will book Louis to do the disco and ask him to do some games.
Jacqui and Rachel will organise the food (more Ham than Cheese rolls after the 5/6 experience!) and party bags (sweets and glosticks) for the children to take home with them. We will give them cornets and Icecream and Sauce as a pudding.
Prizes ? Best Boy Dancer, Best Girl Dancer and Best Boy & Girl (together) Dancers will be given. To try and give all the children some recognition Miss Weaver will ask the Year 3 & 4 Teachers to think of a Best At for each child. School will then print a scroll for each child to be handed out on the night.
Miss Weaver and Michael will look into taking photos (in front of a backdrop) on the night. Michael may be able to project them onto the walls during the event.
We should have enough decorations left from the Year 5/6 evening to decorate the hall. Whoever is available should meet at school on the day at 1.30pm to help set the hall up.
Ingrid, Nikki and Aruna and Jacqui all indicated that they could help.
We need a disco ball - Michael was confident he could find us one to use for the evening.
Summer Fayre ? 9th June.
Meeting arranged to form committee for the 20th March - Gina will get a note out inviting all parents to the meeting.
Treasurers Report
Casey was unable to make the meeting so there was no Treasurers report. However Mr Vye did ask if the PTA would buy Mrs Isaacs a new greenhouse for her Gardening Club so she can grow plants to sell at the Summer Fayre.
The one she wants is £125. It was agreed at the meeting that this could be ordered and PTA would pay.
Mr Vye has also had a quote to move the fence to expand the infant school playground which gets very congested now that we have Abacus. The quote was for approximately £1,000. There was some debate as to whether the PTA should be paying to move a playground fence. Mr Vye reiterated that the fence must be moved to enlarge the playground and to make room for Keeley's playhouse which we hope to have later in the year. It was agreed that Mr Vye would go ahead and get it done and PTA would reimburse the school.
Rachel asked what other things the PTA could do for the children as we are keen to spend some money. She suggested a Storyteller called 'Spellbinders' which were excellent. Mr Vye said he would investigate but he has a Bangra Dance Team booked already. It was suggested that the PTA could pay for all the children to have a school trip rather that just the cost of the coaches. Mr Vye will think about this and we can discuss at the next meeting.
AOB
Ingrid asked if we have a second hand uniform stall we don't but it could be good to have one at the summer fayre. Will be discussed at the summer fayre meeting on 20th March.
Miss Weaver said there was a real problem with clothes being unlabelled in school. Ingrid will think about whether she could approach a label company and co-ordinate selling name labels in school (or possibly laundry pens).
Gina has had the contract for Fred's Flying Circus. We read the contract and it was felt we could meet the conditions. Gina will send a cheque for a deposit of £75 to definitely book the dates. We will discuss more fully how we make the most of the visit at future meetings.
May Day Carnival - Miss Weaver asked if the PTA would do the stall this year. Usually the school does it and raises money for charity. It was agreed that the PTA could organise this and we will donate the money to the Gambia project (GAFSIP). Hopefully then we can get a pitch next to the fire engine which also raises for GAFSIP which is preferable to where they usually put us!! Sue Brookes, Sue Branton, Gina, Jacqui, Ingrid, Rachel all said they would do half and hour or so on the stall on the day.
Mel asked for letter to be sent for the Black Thunders to ask them to attend the Summer Fayre. Gina will organise this.
Mr Vye ,mentioned that the teachers are holding a ball for Keeley in Iron Acton to which her class will be invited.
We had a brief brainstorm as to who we could get to open the summer fayre.
Suggestions included:
JK Rowling (Gina will write and ask-? maybe she will send a letter or something to raffle assuming she won?t be in winterbourne that day!)
Sherrie Eugene
Noel Edmonds
Robin Cousins
Debate more fully at the Summer Fayre meeting on the 20th.
Mr Vye asked that the PTA remember to invite the Bishop of Bristol to the Fayre.
The date of the next meeting was agreed to be Tues 1st May 7.00pm school hall.