After 9 years with the school, 8 years doing the newsletter and 7 years in the library, this is my final newsletter, and I can say it has been an unexpected and fascinating experience.

There have been a lot of changes over the 9 years... with 6 different newsletter office locations and 4 different library locations, there was never time to get sick of the scenery.

I changed the newsletter layout to the blue border version that was used for several years and catalogued around 7,000 books (thanks in part to many generous donations from many families), more than doubling the quantity of books the library had initially. Fortunately, thanks to a generous donation from PFA, we had a 12 month subscription to a cataloguing program (SCIS), which allowed completion of the cataloguing as well as re-catalogiung of the entire non-fiction section, making finding books of a particular topic much easier. The number of kids at the school has more than doubled in that time too so it is all well and truly justified.

In all honesty, it really has been a great experience that I will always look back on with much fondness and pride.

Special thanks to:

Dale Power, for giving me 'creative control'. Whether it be in changing the layout of the library to better suit the school needs or the redesign of the newsletter, and also thanks for not moving the library for the last 4 years...

Alison, Simone & Tammy, for always being generous and helpful and keeping me sane more times than you may realise.

Phil, the IT expert I called on many a time. (The only time I saw Phil worried was the day I accidentally deleted the newsletter page from the school website but, after a minute of stress, he tapped away at the computer for half a minute and saved my head from the chopping block!) Big THANKS again for that one!

Lavinia, my right hand library partner for the last 5 years, contact and book repairer extraordinaire! Thanks for giving me someone to bounce ideas off and saving me from 2 days a week.

Lynette, Donna, Kerri, Sharlene and many other volunteers that have helped with many different aspects of the library over many years. Also good luck to the new volunteers starting out next year. I hope you find it just as enjoyable and rewarding.

The staff here at Miners Rest, it sounds a bit cliche but it really is true, they are a brilliant group of people who genuinely care deeply and always do the very best they can for our kids.

The kids! For driving me crazy then making me laugh many times a day! It has just been a pleasure to see you all growing up so fast!

Lastly, I'd like to encourage everyone to consider volunteering. No matter how much or little time you can spare, there is always something to be done and every small part adds up so it doesn't take long before a huge difference has been made and, at the end of the day, our kids are the ones who benefit from it most of all!

Sandra

Miners Rest Primary School

Issue 40 · 18 Dec 2019

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