P&F News
After several quiet years with few major events organised by the P&F this year was certainly a busy one.
Preliminary discussions last year about Oxley’s 40th birthday all focussed on the same idea of celebration and reconnection. So with these goals in mind the P&F created events for this special year in the life of Oxley College.
A black-tie birthday party was held on the 20th May at Centennial Vineyards restaurant. What a night we had! Current parents, staff, alumni and past parents all came together to dance the night away to the fabulous big band sounds of the John Field band. As a band member and performer, Oxley’s own Dom Lindsay was instrumental to the success of the night. Parent, Chris Ahern, acted as our MC for the evening and controlled a noisy crowd while we conducted a fundraising drive for the newly launched Oxley Foundation. Paul Milner, auctioneer and Oxley parent conducted a live auction while many other items were snapped up in a silent auction. Our thanks to those businesses and individuals who so generously donated items with proceeds going towards the newly created Oxley Foundation.
Ex parent and writer Amanda Mackevicius undertook a mammoth task of writing and compiling the 40th anniversary book of Oxley College–Amanda spent weeks in the archives here at Oxley finding all sorts of newspaper articles, speeches and photographs that she has included in this lovely publication; To think, to dare, to dream. Throughout the process I assisted Amanda in finding photos and information and found myself swept up in the memories of Oxley. I am still blown away by the determination and courage of parents in setting up this school – I thought a Pin Oak Fair was a big deal – but a school??! Please be sure to purchase a copy and spread the word that this is now available for sale.
After several postponements and cancellations due to weather the Oxley Equestrian Day was held this year in Term 3 on the 20 August. Entries were down on previous years, but we were fortunate to hold a successful event with the sun shining. Parents contributed to this event by baking, BBQing, working in the canteen and helping with the overall organisation.
Just a week later a group of enthusiastic junior school parents had us dress up in Prom Night theme as they organised a fabulous whole school trivia night. The committee worked hard to source lots of donated prizes that were raffled and won throughout the evening. Over 120 people attended with some great costumes on display and the PCC has never looked so good. This was a great night for our parent community.
Throughout the year all our wonderful Year reps have organised an amazing variety of functions- there have been drinks nights, dinners and coffee mornings. Thank you to all our year reps who have taken the time to coordinate these functions and provided the opportunities for our parents to meet, and to manage our WhatsApp groups. To our 2023 Yr 12 year reps thank you for organising monthly drinks and a glittering formal for our graduates. We wish you all the best and thank you for your involvement in the P&F.
Planning for the Pin Oak Fair commenced last year when determining a date and format this event would take. Fortunately, the previous Pin Oak Fair committee had extensive notes that were passed on and believe me I thumbed through those pages on many occasions looking for hints or clues on previous numbers, stock quantities and costs. My thanks to Jane Crowley for passing on her knowledge and I am currently compiling a dossier of information that I hope will be just as helpful for the next organising committee.
From our initial planning meetings, the aim of this year’s Pin Oak Fair was to be the ultimate celebration of 40 years and the culmination of a year celebrating the College’s birthday and community re-connection.
The challenges faced in organising such a Fair are many but a few of the greatest were timing and cost and I will address these now as I have been asked often about our decisions.
The previous Pin Oak Fair was held on a Saturday in November in 2016. It was held on a day when Year 12 had finished their exams and held to coincide with the Southern Highlands Art Trail, as an art show was a component of this event. It was purposefully planned on a day when sport was played so this could be showcased and families from visiting schools were sent further information about the fair and invited to attend. The decision to hold the event on a Saturday was based on the fact that many market stallholders, who we were wanting to attract, have regular market commitments on Sundays.
We made the decision to follow the same format this year, for all the same reasons. We were notified once our advertising had commenced that the Art Trail would not be including galleries or school exhibitions as it was only featuring studios this year.
The decision to hold this event on Saturday unfortunately impacted 4 Oxley sports teams who had to travel away for their matches. In our favour was the 7 busloads of athletes who travelled from other schools to play at Oxley and enjoy the fun of the Fair.
The hectic schedule of sport on the day meant that many of our Oxley students who were part of music groups and ensembles were unavailable to perform. Fortunately, the Oxley Pipe Band were still on hand to open the Fair with a wonderful performance through the school grounds.
I am going to mention the weather. Closely reviewing at least 5 weather sites in the lead up to the Fair I think it’s now fair to say that meteorology is not an exact science. While we didn’t have howling winds or driving rain, we had a steady drizzle which I think impacted the numbers of visitors from outside our Oxley community. Our beautifully decorated High tea area possibly suffered due to the weather, but the cool air certainly meant our pizza and gozleme stalls did well on the day. While on the weather a very big thank you to the brave members of Oxley staff who agreed to be ‘dunked’ on the day – such good sports all of them.
Costs – It’s fair to say I felt completely sick and lost a few nights of sleep when we paid the deposit for our amusement rides. I thank AnnMarie Greenop for sharing this sickness and sleeplessness with me! AnnMarie spent many hours researching ride companies and ringing other schools to check the reputation of these companies. It was important for us that we catered for students from K-12 and offered a variety of rides to suit all ages. Previous Pin Oak Figures showed that at the time around 80% of students purchased a wristband (at a similar cost to this year) so we did the maths on our current enrolment numbers and worked out what $ amount we could afford to spend on rides, with our aim being to keep the cost low for our students, and just cover our costs. We also doubled the number of rides we had in 2016.
Every day in the week prior to the Fair we texted each other with the number of wristbands sold, sometimes on an hourly basis, as we were sweating on covering the exorbitant amount of money we spent on rides. The good news is that we covered it and actually had a few hundred dollars over – but not until the day of the Fair. AnnMarie’s Year 12 daughter actually commented that we were starting to look desperate when we turned up at lunchtime and walked around with an EFTPOS machine trying to coax wristband sales out of Oxley students!
If I ever say the word wristband again it will be too soon!
Without any indication of how many people we could expect at the Fair we chose to hire a traffic management company to manage this to reduce risk on the day.
Though our Pin Oak Fair financials are still being tallied we are hoping to come out with some profit but in terms of reaching our goal of celebration and reconnection, I believe we well and truly achieved this. We had over 261 parents sign up to assist – some on more than one timeslot and this number is in addition to the many organisers and P&F year reps who encouraged and supported the event.
Well, the Pin Oak Fair concludes my term as President of the P&F. I am going out on a high – still buoyed by the fabulous community we have here at Oxley. In my years on the P&F I have been fortunate to meet and work with many people and will share memories with them for years to come – I have loved sharing this journey with Sooz Heinrich and AnnMarie Greenop, and can’t thank you ladies enough for your thoughts, advice and encouragement over the many years we have been here together.
At Oxley we are very fortunate to have the full support of our Executive who are always encouraging of any events we organise. Thank you to Scott, Jane and the rest of the Exec for backing us on the events we create and allowing us to have fun along the way.
Thank you to the fabulous dream team of Em Calver, Amberley Guilly and Alex Stone. I met with them all on a monthly basis for most of last year as we started to plan this year’s events, then for the last few terms we’ve met weekly. I have felt constantly supported by all of you and have had a lot of fun working with you.
Emma Calver, I can’t imagine this place without you. You are one of the kindest, caring, and most supportive women I know, and I am glad to consider you a friend. You are a shining jewel in the crown of Oxley and I thank you for your wisdom and constant guiding hand while holding this role within the P&F.
I have a great sense of pride in this school and have really valued the experiences my children have had here. I wish the new P&F committee all the very best for the journey ahead.
Thank you
Mrs Megan Moore, President Oxley College Parents and Friends Association