Go Raibh maith Agat Sarah agus Fiona
Good Evening Everyone, Cead Mile Failte..just to introduce myself, I am the current Treasurer of the Naiscoil Sheila Fearon, I have been on the committee now almost 5 years, some of your faces I know and you may know me also.
Firstly I would like to thank our brilliant Staff Sarah, Anita, Louise, Leanne and Annmarie, special mention to Anita for agreeing to step into Sarah’s role during her maternity leave and doing a sterling job as always, I know she is very much appreciated by both her colleagues and the committee, also thanks to our Committee members for their continued support, help and attendance at our meetings throughout the year.
Usually, the AGM is our opportunity to report our financial position at the end of the year however our accounts have not yet been released by our accountant GP Boyle as our year end is the 30[th] June. We are holding our AGM this evening in June rather than July /August as previous, as we have found the summer months leave it harder to get parents on board to join our committee due to holiday clashes etc. Our accounts will be completed and uploaded online the coming weeks, thankfully I can say that although we have had a very difficult two years we are currently not in a deficit financial position.
Just To reiterate what Fiona and has just said and unknown to many the Naiscoil has charity status and therefore the majority of our capital stems from our fund-raising efforts throughout the year, as you can imagine our efforts have been hampered and pretty much restricted this past 2 years due to the lockdown, that together with the rising cost of living, overheads etc has had a financial strain on the Naiscoil. We have just this month been informed of a rental increase on the centre which we are currently working through. We do receive funding from the education board for each child however this funding is to pay the wages and currently does not cover the cost of all wages, We are lucky in the fact we received additional covid funding last year which allowed an additional member of staff to be paid, this additional member was a vital requirement due staff changes, Sarah going on maternity and the ratios per child changing and also additional daily cleaning being required due to the pandemic.
With regards our fundraising, To give you a breakdown or brief overview, of our annual fundraising methods, you may have noticed we have our yellow
coin boxes located in numerous shops / outlets across the community, we do the bucket collection each Halloween in the month of October at the gates of the market and we also hold our pub quiz and Christmas fundraiser been our Santa drive through last December.
The fundraising has took in approx. 4000STG from Sept last year.
As I mentioned, due to the pandemic we did receive additional funding last year, with we utilised very well, this funding is allocated for certain equipment /resources many Thanks for Sarah for her successful applications for this funding, We received £1224 from Extended services Fund which we used for the Sticky fingers Arts programme each Wednesday. £5943 Engage funding, which helped pay Annemaries wages, £1000 from the Dept Education outdoor learning, which enabled us to purchase two buddy benches, balance scales and a music frame. £1275 Sustainability grant from Early Years, this was to compensate for covid expenses.
With regards this years funding we have not had notification as yet what the current allocation per child will be from the Education Authority or if it will increase and if any additional funding with be available to us, We would hope a oil/electric grant may be made available for us due to the increased in energy bills and as I mentioned which would go a long towards the rental increase we are facing.
In conclusion and taking the above into account We would appeal to our new parents, grandparents to please come on board and help us with these fundraising events, there are small jobs required, from emptying /sorting the coin boxes, holding at bucket at the market collection. It is imperative for continued running of our school that we raise funds, we meet once a month and All new faces and ideas our welcome and much appreciated.
Many Thanks for your time this evening and best of luck to our new intake including my own for September.