Community rallies to ensure primary school students all get Christmas gifts

THREE KEY FACTS

• Hundreds of students were expected to miss out on Christmas gifts after a technical error.
• Naenae Primary School has now been flooded with gifts after making a plea on Facebook.
• Deputy principal Kirsten Reid said the school has been ‘overwhelmed’ by the community response after a hard week.

The community has come to the rescue after a technical glitch meant hundreds of decile one primary students were set to go home empty-handed from the school’s Christmas gift appeal.

The Shoebox Christmas appeal allows lower decile schools to sign up their students to receive a box of presents to make sure every child has a gift.

Staff at Naenae Primary School were devastated yesterday as they contemplated giving presents to some children and none to others, after an error with their sign-up sheet left them short by hundreds of shoeboxes.

Staff at Naenae Primary School are sorting through mountains of gifts donated for the school's Shoebox Christmas appeal.

The Excel spreadsheet containing each child’s name, age, and present suggestions had malfunctioned and only one page was working.

“We had 140 boxes come in and still needed about 220,” said deputy principal Kirsten Reid.

“That’s a really hard predicament for the school.”

The staff met yesterday to discuss what to do, thinking they would have to wait until the school day finished to give gifts to only some of the students so that those who weren’t receiving anything wouldn’t see.

One ex-staff member offered $1500, which unfortunately would still not be enough for all the required gifts.

But after a last-minute plea on a Lower Hutt community Facebook page, the school has now been flooded with gifts, to the point it is now looking to give some away to others in need.

“We have had an error in our Shoe Box Christmas allocation this year and not all our tamariki will receive a shoe box,” Reid wrote in the post.

“Our school closes tomorrow at 12pm. This is a HUGE ask but if you have any little gifts and can drop them into our school we would be VERY grateful. We have had some wonderful people offer to donate gifts but we still won’t have enough for our beautiful tamariki. Thank you in advance.”

Children will be able to have more than one gift each this year.

This morning, Reid said staff were “overwhelmed” and “very, very grateful” at the response from the community.

They now had “more than enough” and were still getting boxes and presents dropped off from members of the public, local businesses, and ex-pupils.

Reid said they were “so grateful for the manaakitanga and aroha in our community”.

“The tamariki are going to get more than one present each.”

The shoebox scheme allows each individual child to receive a present personally chosen for them, in the range of $30-$50.

Reid said it had been a tough week for the Naenae community, which has been rocked by a fatal shooting carried out in broad daylight just around the corner from the school as students were on their way home.

The gifts in the Shoebox Christmas appeal are individually chosen for each child.

Then on Saturday night a 5-year-old child drowned at a popular nearby park, causing further waves of grief in the community.

The Christmas spirit shown by locals has since given staff something to smile about.

“People are so kind and generous,” said Reid, adding that staff were sorting through “mountains of gifts” this morning.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” she said to those who have donated.

Children are receiving their presents about midday when the school finishes for the year.

Melissa Nightingale is a Wellington-based reporter who covers crime, justice and news in the capital. She joined the Herald in 2016 and has worked as a journalist for 10 years.