Dear Parents/Guardians,

We hope you are keeping well this week. Our news is as follows

• On Thursday the 24^th of October St Tolas infamous Halloween Quiz will make it’s come back.  Tables are €20, 4 people per table with a minimum of one adult.  There will be spot prizes and a tuck shop on the night.  If anyone has spot prizes they would like to donate or wish to book a table please contact Múinteoir Fíona through the office.
• A meeting will take place next Tuesday 17^th September here in the school to elect a parent nominee (mother) to the Board of Management. All parents are eligible to nominate and all mothers of pupils currently enrolled in the school are eligible to nominate themselves and stand for election.
• Our Junior Infants are staying for their first full school day today. They will attend from 9a.m. to 1.40p.m. They are very excited about getting their “big lunch” and we are looking forward to having them here for their full day. I am delighted to see how well Juniors are settling into school routines and learning lots of new things. Well done Juniors!
• Some of our pupils are brought to school by bus. Can you please ensure you are not totally blocking the car park in the morning so that the bus can safely enter and leave. The bus has to drop pupils to other schools also and needs to be able to exit the car park easily. Also there are two disabled parking spaces in the car park. These are needed for pupils who are wheelchair users. Please do not park in or block these spaces. If there is no place in the car park the Gardai have told us it is ok to park on the road as long as you do not block a neighbour’s driveway. We would also respectfully ask that you do not park at the back of the houses in Collins Park beside the school. Some of the neighbours have informed us that they have been blocked in and have been unable to get out in time for work. This is unfair.  We thank you for your co-operation in this matter.
• Can you please ensure that your child has a coat in school for the cooler days that are fast approaching. We will be going outside if it is dry every day. Please make sure that your child’s name is on the coat so we can return coats to their rightful owners.
• 5^th and 6^th classes have started swimming lessons this week. Swimming is part of the Physical Education curriculum for primary schools.  Shannon Leisure Centre now bill us for the number of pupils booked irrespective if they attend every lesson or not. We have to ask that parents pay €30 to cover the costs of the six lessons upfront.
• At the start of the school year we remind pupils that the two most important rules in St Tolas are BE KIND  and TRY YOUR BEST.  Be kind means looking out for each other, watching how we speak to each other and if you hurt someone you make it up to them. Try your best means being willing to give things a go even if they are hard. We all make mistakes and that is part of learning too and we try our best to learn from those mistakes and move on.

Kind regards, Mary Dunlea Fitzgerald, School Principal

Dear Parents/Guardians,

We hope you are keeping well as we approach the end of our first full week back at school. Our news is as follows

• Last school year we consulted parents, pupils and staff around benefits and concerns of technology in pupils’ lives. We had fantastic parent engagement on this with many parents completing an online survey and a good turn out at a consultation meeting held here in the school. We have put together a document with advice and guidance on recommended best practise in different areas of technology use along with resources that may be useful to you. The thinking behind this document is that if we all in the school community agree to some ground rules it makes it easier for our pupils. We are sending out a hard copy today in your child’s bag of our Agree to Agree Internet and Technology User Agreement. We have also included a page for parents and child to sign if they wish to try it out and this can be returned to the school. This is an entirely voluntary code. Please take the time to discuss this with your child and as a family and decide what will work best for you in your family situation. I would like to thank all parents, pupils and staff who have contributed to this document. We all want to keep our pupils safe as they navigate the online world. I have attached a letter from the Minister for Education in relation to smartphones that was received by all schools recently.
• If you know your child is going to be absent for a number of days we would ask that you turn off their hot lunch order for those days to avoid waste. Please note we still operate a healthy eating policy and all snacks and drinks must adhere to this policy. We are also a nut free school as a number of pupils have severe nut allergies and we would ask that you check your child’s snack items to ensure they are nut free. we thank you for your co-operation in this matter.
• Our school days starts at 9a.m. sharp each morning. The doors are not open until 8.45a.m. and pupils will be supervised from that time. Some teachers arrive before this time and use this time to organise and prep for the day ahead. We have assigned doors for each class to ensure safe and orderly entrance and egress of the building. Juniors and Seniors use the side gate beside their classrooms, 1^st use the side door at the front of the building, 2^nd use the back gate, 3^rd and 4^th use the door beside the 4^th class room while 5^th and 6^th have their own entrance at the front of the building. Juniors will finish at 12p.m. up to and including Wednesday 11^th September. From Thursday 12^th September Juniors will finish at 1.40p.m.
• Swimming lessons start next week for 5^th and 6^th classes only in Shannon Leisure Centre. 5^th will start on Wed 11^th September and 6^th on Thursday 12^th September.  They will run for 6 weeks and cost €30. We have to ask that you pay for all lessons as the Leisure Centre charges us for the total number of pupils booked. You can make this payment via the Aladdin link or send in the money to the office.

Kind regards,

Mary Dunlea Fitzgerald, School Principal