Volunteering at YAS

Supportive partnerships between home and school contribute to the success of our school. We value parent and community involvement in a range of formal and informal ways. Below is a list of ways you can volunteer in our school:

LAP/School Mentoring Programs - see below
The Reading Café - held in the Library every Thursday from 8:30 - 9:00 am
School Canteen
Governing Council
Class Room Reading
Excursion Help
Knitting Nanna’s
Admin Help
Library Help
Sporting Events & SAPSASA
Breakfast Club
Music

and any other areas you can offer your special talents. We welcome all volunteers either on a regular basis or for one off events.

Do any of these areas sound interesting? If they do, please contact our Volunteer Coordinator, Trudy Noack at trudy.noack740@schools.sa.edu.au. For more information on volunteering with the Department for Education please click HERE.

NATIONAL VOLUNTEER WEEK

Every year we celebrate National Volunteer Week in some way. In 2021 in conjunction with The Department for Education, Y.A.S. acknowledged N.V.W. by holding a morning tea for Schools in the southern area for a Southern Hub Celebration. Heidi Unferdorben, Senior Policy and Project Officer for Volunteers, and Sonia Parker, Principal, spoke of the valuable contribution our volunteers make to schools.

The volunteer guest speakers were Graham and Monique Williams who joined the volunteer mentoring team about 5 years ago. They spoke about their experiences during their lifetime of volunteering. The Food and the Community Class led by Fiona Adams, Deputy Principal, provided the catering which included Miss Buttercup and her crew of student baristas. Entertainment was provided by the Reception/1 Class with an array of happy and toe tapping songs learnt from Kay Barnes our Choir Volunteer.

To end the formal proceedings a volunteer from each school was invited to cut the enormous celebration cake.

The volunteers had plenty of time to mingle and get to know each other and a few friendships were formed in the photo booth.

The event was an excellent celebration for our volunteers and a true testament to School Communities working together to show appreciation of others.

THE LEARNING ASSISTANCE PROGRAMME (LAP)

“Enabling students to develop resilience and wellbeing through positive mentoring”

The L.A.P. Mentoring Program is a school-based program relying on volunteers to fulfil its task. Each volunteer works one-to-one with a child each week for about forty-five minutes – 1 hour. The child has been carefully matched to the mentor and has been identified as benefiting from the program. The main aim of the volunteer mentor is to support the development of the child's self-esteem. Volunteer mentors come from all walks of life and can be interested community members, parents, grandparents, old scholars and senior students. They each bring with them many special talents skills and interests to share with their student, examples being craft, gardening, cooking, knitting, woodwork, computers, reading, helping with a special project, writing, spelling, photography, chess and board game enthusiast and the list goes on.

Having another person by your side, who believes in you and is prepared to commit to helping you achieve your goals is life changing. Mentoring is making a positive di

fference in the lives of many students across the school and they are showing significant improvement in their relationships with their peers, family and friends. Our L.A.P. Mentors ha

ve found the work both rewarding and stimulating. Volunteer Mentors have the opportunity to attend coffee mornings, workshops and training where they can learn new skills and interact with other mentors. The kettle is always on to have a coffee and chat at any given opportunity too.

We welcome you to come and discover what it feels like to work in a one-to-one learning environment.

For more information contact our Volunteer Coordinator, Trudy Noack at trudy.noack740@schools.sa.edu.au. or visit the LAP Website http://lap.org.au/index.html or download or LAP Brochure.