What an exciting but exhausting year 2022 has been so far! Early in March we were invited to enter a competition: Do you think your school is world class? Five categories were offered, and we decided to enter them all as we truly believe we are world class! That decision resulted in five people spending five full days writing why PNPS is world class in Overcoming Adversity, Innovation, Sustaining Healthy Lives, Environmental Action and in Community Collaboration.
We received great news in May but were sworn to confidentiality until 9 June when the whole world would receive a press release, announcing that Pinelands North was one of ten finalists in Overcoming Adversity! Every finalist was asked to arrange an event in their country on 9 June so that the announcement could be made public knowledge.
Do you know how difficult it is to get well-known personalities, the entire school community, the press, social media and education department officials to an event without being able to tell them why they should attend? Luckily, we had already invited our school community to some ‘gees’ creating events earlier in the term and so we tagged the idea to that and Youth Day, which in South Africa falls on 16 June, the following week. Overcoming Adversity fits in perfectly with Youth Day! Guests were told that they needed to be on the field between 10:00 and 12:00, wearing colours of the rainbow and to believe that the visit would be worth their while! Our families were asked to bring their children to school for only those two hours that day – and nobody complained!
Tents were erected around the field for each grade to offer the school community an activity - like face painting, flag making, games, doughnut decorating and an opportunity to create mindful bookmarks. Red carpets were laid out, food trucks offered refreshments, a shuttle service offered families to chance to ‘park and ride’ and the marimba team entertained us with foot stomping music! Photographers were quick to capture every beautiful moment!
When guests arrived, they were ushered to the astro on the field where a social café atmosphere allowed them to meet and greet, enjoy coffee in their own ‘take home’ souvenir mug or go and enjoy the festivities in the tents.
Premier Alan Winde arrived just before 11:00 when the more formal ceremony was to commence. The choir entertained the school and then Joanne Peers, the Community Support Co-ordinator and parent, set the scene by linking the history of the struggle on Youth Day, with how our school has worked on helping the community overcome adversity over the past while.
One thousand people on the field still didn’t really know why they were there until Premier Alan Winde announced that the school was one of ten finalists in the world, and one of only two in South Africa! The crowd went wild: with South African flags waving, the entire community stood up and sang the National Anthem. What a moving moment for all present!
After the announcement, the school and the education department were allowed to share the information far and wide. Public relations experts, photographers, radio station hosts and the press, and social media influencers were all rallied to tell the story of the school as widely as possible.
The top three schools in each category were announced in June and Pinelands North made the cut! This resulted in T4 Education creating a video of our school journey and us receiving loads of media attention from the world.
The next big event was World Education Week, held online in October. This event showcased the 50 top schools around the world in a one-week extravaganza! Pinelands North was given a one-hour slot on 18 October to tell the world about what we were doing, to enable other schools around the world to follow our lead.
The following day the winners in each category were announced: Project Shelter Wakadogo in Uganda won our category as their teachers spent 36 000 hours teaching their students in their own homes during Covid!
We are thrilled we entered the competition as it gave us an opportunity to re-evaluate what we do daily within our school community, and to appreciate the journey we have been on through the recent past.
