Greenlanes N.S. Parents’ Association- End of Year Report (2019/2020)
Prepared by Jane Sevastopulo and AnnMarie Avery, Co-Chairs of Greenlanes Parents' Association
Despite the abrupt shortening of the school year last school year, due to COVID-19, a huge congratulations to the Greenlanes parents and guardians for all your hard work. We managed to achieve a significant amount given how short the school year turned out to be. Here's what the Greenlanes PA (i.e., all of you!) got up to this year. This year, we include an introduction from Rev. Lesley Robinson:
On behalf of the Board of Management
Firstly, may I convey my very best wishes to each and every one of you in these very challenging times. I would also like to compliment you all for the help and encouragement you gave your children while they were learning exclusively online from March - June, and thank you for your continued cooperation with our Covid Response Plan.
On a sad note, all of us on the Board were shocked and saddened to hear of the recent passing of Alan Harper, who was a parent in the school until Claudia and Emily left us to go to Mount Temple in June of this year. Alan also served on and made a valuable contribution to the Board of Management until last year and was an active member of the Parents Association throughout the girls' time in Greenlanes. Our thoughts and prayers are very much with Michelle, Claudia, Emily and Sheena at this sad time.
Rev. Lesley Robinson,
Chairperson
Activities in Greenlanes
Coffee morning to welcome new/returning parents on the first day back at school in September 2019.
Parents’ Association. An AGM was held in September 2019 to elect a new committee, all the previous committee members stayed on, and in addition we welcomed Lorna Cahill, Olivia Whelan, Celine Caulfield and Quan Hanlon.
Jane Sevastopulo and AnnMarie Avery acted as Co-chairs for 2018/2019, and stayed on as Co-Chairs for 2019/2020. Jane Schwartzbacher remained the Secretary, Sara Nolan remained the Treasurer (despite the small matter of giving birth to gorgeous twin girls in lockdown), and Fiona Knox stayed as our Communication Officer. Elke Köker continued as a long-standing member of the PA.
The Board of Management held elections in November for new Parent Representatives - well done and thanks to Kim Brady and Colm Sevastopulo for being voted onto the Greenlanes Board of Management, they are also ex-officio members of the PA. A sincere thank you to the retiring Parent Representatives, Kate Robbins and the late Alan Harper.
During 2019/2020 regular Focus Group meetings were held with the school (usually the Principal; Ms. Atkin, Acting Deputy Principal; Ms. Johnston, and the Chairperson of the Board of Management; Rev. Lesley, together with the Co-Chairs and Secretary of the PA), both in person before March, and virtually afterwards, and regular committee meetings were held throughout the year, again, all by Zoom after March.
Thank you to all the class reps for passing on all the information and helping to foster good relationships in the school community.
Greenlanes Bookclub. The Greenlanes Bookclub is a parent-led initiative that has run for the last four years. Each class has four bookclub sessions, where the children divide into small groups and are read to: in 2019/2020 they enjoyed Irish myths, short stories, and the poetry of Michael Rosen. Despite the early school closure in March, we managed to hold sessions for all the children from second to sixth class, and we hope to resume bookclub sessions when the current restrictions ease.
Run as a pilot for third class in 2016/2017 by Elke Köker, Eadaoin Patton and their team, the Greenlanes bookclub has gone from strength to strength. Many thanks to this fantastic team.
Student Council. The PA suggested at a focus group meeting that a Student Council might be formed, and were delighted when the school took this suggestion on and the Greenlanes Student Council was founded in September 2019. Comprised of students from 5th and 6th classes, one of the first things that they did was give Richard Bruton T.D., Minister for the Environment at the time, a comprehensive grilling on several topics when he visited the school in November 2019, he heard the childrens’ thoughts on how we can make changes to better care for our world. Well done to all members of the Student Council and those who had questions for the Minister for being great ambassadors of the school. We should all be proud to have such a great bunch of articulate, kind and caring children.
HB Fundays Ice Cream Day. The PA hosted an Ice Cream Day to fundraise for Down syndrome Ireland on 25th October 2019. All the children enjoyed ice cream donated by HB Fundays campaign on the last day before midterm and parents were asked for a €1 donation to help this great charity. €333 was raised, well done everyone!
School Library and Celtic Book Fair. Held in November 2019. Thanks to the generous support given by Greenlanes families to the book fair, we were able to stock the school library with the most popular books from the year.
Bakesale. Led by Michelle Harper and her team, this now annual event raised €1087,25 in December 2019 which went towards new technology for the school. Thanks to everyone who either baked, helped or supported. A particular thank you to Zsuzsi, Mum of Kolos, Lazar, Lukacs and Grete, for the super cake which she donated to raffle. Also, a special thanks to Michelle Harper, whose children finished 6th class in June 2020, so this was her last time to organise the Bakesale as a parent of the school.
Greenlanes Athletics Program. With the blessing of the school, the PA arranged and funded, with help from Gerard O’Rourke, for Louise Keogh (Raheny Shamrocks AC) to begin athletics coaching at school. She has given us the following report:
From October 2019 until March 2020 Athletics was taught in the school to 3rd-6th class. Each class had 30 minutes per week. Sessions varied to introduce the pupils to all events covered in athletics- Sprints, long distance, long jump, javelin, shot putt, Hurdles.
From Nov -Dec emphasis was placed on practice for the upcoming North Dublin Schools Cross Country which was held in St. Anne’s Park at the beginning of December. The school did exceptionally well across the board.
In December we had our inaugural Santa Dash where all classes raced along the avenue in St. Anne’s in all their Christmas finery.
The new year saw more practice of the track and field events with an introduction to relays and correct baton changes, preparing early for the Cumann Na mBunscoil competition in Santry in May.
But like all school activities athletics was halted due to Covid 19.
Luckily with the great work of the PA the 6th class got to have their sports day in June with relays, long distance sprint and a novelty obstacle race. It was lovely to see the 6th class crew before they went their separate ways and hopefully continue their interest in athletics.
It was a pure joy to coach the kids and prove that athletics is a sport for all not just the fastest. It was wonderful to see all the kids improve and grow in confidence week by week.
Thank you for giving me the opportunity to coach your kids.
Bag packing. A huge thank you to Sara Nolan, who organised a bag packing fundraising weekend in Supervalu Killester in February 2020. €1320 was raised by all the children and parents, which went towards building a new workbench/storage area for the school atrium. A great effort, and the last in-person fundraising that we managed to do.
Boots for Africa. Peter Kelly arranged for a collection of old sports boots for charity. Boots for Africa was started prior to the 2010 World Cup in South Africa by Richard Tims, the now chairman of Sheffield FC. Collecting in Australia, Ireland and setting up soon in Italy.
We would like to thank Greenlanes for your continued support and look forward to showing the kids the great smiles they are bringing to underprivileged kids by the gesture of a simple pair of 2nd hand boots, something many kids take for granted. Over 130 pairs of boots were donated by Greenlanes families.
www.bootsforafrica.org for more information.
Greenlanes Tea Towels. The PA, coordinated by Jane Schwartzbacher, together with Camden clothing, created a unique Greenlanes 2019/2020 tea towel! They were only €5 and captured all Greenlanes children signatures!! €362 was raised.
National Parent Council. We continued involvement with the NPC including sharing their info and resources. This included a Transition from primary to post primary education training session in September 2019 for 5th and 6th classes.
A survey was completed by parents, who voted for the next parent talks to be Building healthy friendships and relationships by NPC. This was held at the school on Thursday 23rd of January.
Environmental initiatives. Some of the Greenlanes students and parents attended the School Strike for Climate Change on 20th September 2019.
As with last year, the school restarted the WOW’s (Walk on Wednesday’s) campaign to encourage walking/cycling/scooting all or part way to school! Each class competed to win the golden boot award!
Sports equipment. The PA continued to work with David O’Sullivan in 2019/2020, updating the school’s sports and play equipment for the children. A total of €2,721 was spent on new goals, hurdles, balls, nets and other equipment.
Aldi Play Rugby campaign. Thanks to all parents and children who kindly collected and brought in Aldi vouchers to school. 5th Class completed the poster this year. School received a variety of new equipment in January 2020, including: a training ladder, signed rugby balls by Paul O'Connell, cones, training mats, gear bags and sports water bottles. This has added to the new collection of sports equipment in the P.E shed and children really enjoying using them!
Covid-19 Lockdown initiatives
St. Patrick’s Day. Immediately after lockdown began, the PA shared the idea of children creating and parents sending St Patrick’s day pictures to their teachers for them to put in their class blogs. This was a fun way to start lockdown, and make the children feel connected in uncertain times. We want to thank everyone for taking part in this!
School Closure Parent Survey. After the first few weeks of lockdown the school reached out to the PA to collect feedback on how parents and children were finding the communication and new technologies they were using. This was required to tweak anything and to plan lessons/materials going forward. We had great participation in the survey, thank you! The PA collated and analysed results from the survey and had a follow-up meeting with the school. The school asked us to convey to parents their thanks for their support and work to support their children at home despite the many challenges they faced. There were mixed reviews, but overall the majority of parents were satisfied with the support, communication and technologies.
Changes were implemented and the school made steps towards other suggestions. Thanks again to all the parents for their patience, support and enthusiasm during a really stressful time for most families.
Sponsored walk. June 5th 2020 should have been the annual Greenlanes sponsored walk. Ger O’Rourke has led the sponsored walks for the previous four years now, and it is now a highlight of the school year. We were all very sad that we weren’t able to do the sponsored walk in 2020, however, the children were sent a link to a trail from Clontarf Baths to the Wooden Bridge, that Mr. Lalor very kindly shared and many others walked the woodland trail in St. Anne's Park with their families, having fun, staying safe and staying within their 5k.
6th Class Graduation and Sports Day. Gerard O’Rourke has given us the following report:
The Class of 2020 almost left Greenlanes in March 2020 forever. Then an easing in restrictions allowed us an opportunity to gather the two 6th classes one final time just before the summer holidays. We managed to run a Sports Day, filled with fun, some keen races, music and ice cream . We then had the same chance to give them the right of passage and their Graduation Ceremony. All held outdoors, everything got moved outside, chairs, big screens, speakers and microphones. We even got some big gazebos to shield the sunlight off the screens and keep the students in the shade. That afternoon we held a BBQ and they all had one last moment of freedom in Greenlanes which was their home and safe place for the last 8 years. Congratulations to the Class of 2020 and the very best of luck in Secondary School
It was a fantastic couple of days and hopefully the students of 2020 had this opportunity to say goodbye properly to their friends and many teachers at Greenlanes. Everybody worked hard to make this happen, particularly Cathy Atkin accompanied by teachers and parents. A big thank you also to the Board of Management for having the confidence in us to do this right. We would also like to thank Kinara for the loan of the big gazebos.
Photos of Sixth Class & Junior Infants. Arranged by Sarah Armstrong, in an ordinary year, every May Junior Infant and Sixth class final year photographs are done. However, as the school closed in March, the usual May slot was gone for the school photos. Thankfully the sixth classes were allowed into the school in June to have some final time in Greenlanes. Sarah was able to jump on the opportunity and last minute arranged Michelle La Grue, to come in for a few hours to capture, for the students that wanted, their final primary school photo. Each parent pre paid the required amount so no monies were exchanged and for the social distance requirements, the corridor in the school was used, which made for a very poignant moment as they had walked that corridor for many a year. Sarah heard great feedback from the parents as the photographs turned out really well in that location.
For the group photo, the classes were set up outside for their Graduation ceremony so they jumped on that opportunity. It was a bit of a last minute dash but they got a class photo of each class for the records.
Junior Infants 2019/2020 will hopefully get to have their photos taken as soon as restrictions have eased enough.
2020/2021 Junior Infant classes & 6th Class will hopefully be photographed in May 2021.
Reopening school. The PA worked with school to help with the reopening in September 2020. This was a big challenge for the school so the PA assisted with organising drop off and pick up. We reached out and rounded some great parent volunteers to help. Some of us met in the school and discussed ideas of how this could be done.
As a result of this, we were able to start school with a plan that continued to be tweaked in the first few days. Thanks to the cooperation of everyone, the school has been very successful in managing the ongoing public health guidelines.
Cycling buses and School Zone. Donna Cooney has very kindly given us this report:
The Greenlanes Cycle Bus was organised by parents after a call out by the Principal Cathy Atkin to assist with return to school and issues with congestion and safety at the school gate and the extra concern with COVID-19 and the need for physical distancing. Councillor Donna Cooney, a parent of Sam in 6th class, suggested the Cycle bus, and Ms. Atkin asked Donna to run with it. The core team consisting of Jane Sevastopulo, Maria O’Brien and Donna had already been working on possible solutions to address safety at the school entrance so they took on the task of setting up the school cycle buses.
In August we had a trial cycle bus run on what is now the Green route from the Spar on Stiles Road to Greenlanes. We were accompanied by a number of Dublin City Council engineers and others from the Covid mobility team. They accessed possible risks and suggested measures to help improve safety en route and around the school. This included increasing phasing at the traffic lights to favour our cycle bus en route, access to Woodside car park for park and stride, fresh paint of school entrance and then the pencil boards and road markings to create a school zone. We also agreed to help promote the cycle bus as a solution to active transport to school and we appeared in articles in The Irish Times twice and on radio.
We then put a survey together which went out to all parents and this showed a high level of interest in participating in the cycle bus, we also were able to map out two routes, purple and green from the post codes provided. Donna applied for cycle stands from Dublin City council and when they were delivered, Cathy had the ground work completed and ready for installing.
Another parent, Aaron Copeland, came on board our cycle bus steering group to help with his experience and stills and he made a wonderful promotional video of the children in the cycle bus.
We would like to thank the Clontarf Residents Association who helped us by promoting our cycle bus on their website and social media and asking drivers to be extra cautious.
Our cycle bus was helpful in meeting the criteria for active transport plan needed to process our application for a School Zone. We are still awaiting an application for a traffic warden to cross Mount prospect road and a pedestrian crossing in 2021. Green School will be supplying us with some lights and bells for the children in the cycle bus.
None of this would have been possible without the support and participation of the parents, the Parents’ Association and the Co-chairs.
Looking ahead…. A huge round of applause for all your support last year and continued involvement in the Greenlanes school community. If you would like to be involved in Greenlanes PA, please let us know through This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it. and find out how you can contribute towards your child’s education. As we retire as Co-Chairs of the PA, we would like to thank everyone for all your support over the last two years.
Jane Sevastopulo and AnnMarie Avery, Co-chairs of Greenlanes Parents' Association
