Maintenance Billboard

The school appreciates the commitment you made, when enrolling your child at Northside, to attend Working Bees each year.

Working Bees are a regular and necessary means of keeping the grounds of the school safe and attractive for our children and to keep the maintenance costs of the school, and hence school fees, as low as possible.  The work you do at working bees is work we don’t have to pay a contractor to do.  Working bees are held on one Sunday morning per term, from 9:00am to 12:00 noon. Please attend for the whole of this time so the necessary work planned for the day can be achieved.

Attendance at a working bee is compulsory for every parent, although you may elect to pay the stipulated fee in lieu of attendance ($300 per family or $150 per working bee) or you may send the same parent from a family to attend two working bees!

If you have difficulty attending on a Sunday, it is your individual responsibility to make alternative arrangements to complete your required duty. Do this by contacting the office on the numbers below.

In recent years, parents have not attended their allocated working bee throughout the year, resulting in insufficient numbers of parents to complete the necessary work at working bees early in the year. An extremely large number of parents, too unwieldy to manage and too large for the workload, then present themselves at the final working bee of the year. As a result, the process has been tightened this year to prevent this impractical situation recurring.  If you do not attend your allocated working bee, you will be invoiced for the fee in lieu immediately following the working bee you have missed.

As always, if you cannot attend your allocated working bee date, you can arrange a swap with a family allocated a working bee later in the year.  The person requesting the swap must notify the office in writing (email is fine) before the working bee or you will be invoiced for the fee in lieu of attendance.

Finally,

• Please be reasonable and attend for the 3 hours requested. If you arrive at 10:00am and leave at 11:00am you will be asked to attend a further working bee.
• Children are welcome at working bees but must stay out of the classrooms.  Please do not send your children to do your working bee for you.
• The parent managing the working bee is one of you and appreciates your full cooperation with all the Occupational Health and Safety guidelines he/she sets down at the start of the day.  We ask that you bring your own garden gloves and sun hat.  Safety goggles will be supplied for those who need them during the day.

If you are in any doubt about any aspect of Working Bees, or wish to make alternative arrangements, do not hesitate to contact our Business Manager, Liz Percy in the School Office on 9144-2835 or admin@northsidemontessori.com.au.