Chairlady's Report A.G.M. Saturday April 24th 2004

This, our third AGM is a time when changes are made to the Committee. When the association was resurrected three years ago, a committee was formed mainly from a group of us who were meeting regularly, now it is time for some new faces. During the past three years, Muriel has been the mainstay in the organisation, sending out letters, minutes and vital information. Evelyn has been a valuable assistant secretary during the last year and she is now willing to take Muriel's place. We have been fairly lucky with volunteers for the committee, we have not had to bribe, threaten or twist arms to find members willing to take on the various roles. Further details regarding a new committee will be discussed later in the meeting. I know you will join me in thanking the original committee for their work during the past three years, especially Pam who unfortunately had to resign as Chairlady last year for personal reasons - she was a hard act to follow!

It is pleasant to meet old friends like this at least once a year (obviously many of you meet much more frequently than that) and to reminisce about school days and later years. How is it we can remember so clearly what happened at school but can't recall what happened yesterday? It can't be that we're getting old, because while we remember our youth we will be forever young.

I hope you enjoy the your lunch and the rest of the day.

Thank You, Lynne Reed

Starting with last year’s A.G.M. and Lunch we were successful in persuading Yorkshire Life magazine to cover the event and they ran a significant piece including photographs in their May (or June?) issue.

Coverage of the Association’s activities during the rest of the year was quite good. The Scarborough Evening News was the most responsive, featuring various articles on the Association. Their coverage of the Autumn Lunch and the visit to the old school premises by some of the members was comprehensive.

I sent press releases and e-mails this year to a wider variety of publications than the previous year and the response was reasonable. Overall, we managed to achieve mentions in several papers and magazines. The Dalesman, Yorkshire Life, the Ridings Magazine, Scarborough Evening News, Gazette and Herald, Malton Mercury and Whitby Gazette were all contacted at different times during the year and most of them managed some coverage, however small.

The Secretary very kindly provided photographs where requested by different publications.

The most recent press coverage was of this year’s A.G.M. and lunch. Information was sent to various publications and the Scarborough Evening News ran an article on Friday 16 April.

To sum up, I think we have done reasonably well in achieving coverage of our activities over the past year.

Fay Yeomans

Publicity Officer

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