Celebrating 60 years of DPS with Joanne

To celebrate our 60th Birthday we are going to share photos and stories from past pupils.  We are going to share in their successes and celebrate as a community :-)  Our first story just had to be our very own Joanne!

Hi my name is Joanne Dougherty. I attended Donemana Primary school from 1975 to 1981and I've been working in Donemana primary school from 1995 and I'm still there nearly 30years later! 

I loved school and our playground.  We had big gym bars outside and I loved playing on them. I did fall off the odd time but hey you got up cried then played on!  My sister's started the same year as we moved from England to Donemana. My best friend was Charlotte Dougherty who came from Glenagoorland school when I was in P3. We were in the same class up until P7 and I remember us winning the 3 legged race most of the time making us very proud.  We loved playing rounders and Charlotte was a very fast runner, I was ok.  We are now married to two brothers so we even have the same surname! My favourite teacher was Mrs Christy.

I have 5 sons who also attended the school and all have great jobs.  I have a joiner and scaffolder, a couple construction workers who love driving forklifts, a musician and civil servant and a welder and fabricator so I'm very proud of them all.  I even took my eldest Gary to the office one day.

I have been working in Donemana school since 1995 and I can honestly say I've loved it. I have the most amazing and funny colleagues and I trust them 100% we have shared so many stories happy and sad they are actually friends.

I have  taught/supervised and of course even scolded LOL so many kids including my own.  Some past pupils even have their children now attending which I think is awesome showing that Donemana has a great sense of community.

I started working with Mrs Thompson who I called Mrs T . Mrs T was amazing and always had time for the kids.  She loved nature and always laughed when we went to the woods for walks as I hated spiders and couldn't scream as I'd scare the kids!  We had so many laughs through the years and when she retired I cried the whole day and missed her every day, I still do especially when I'm clearing out the classroom and come across things and I can say fondly oh that's Mrs T's.

I have worked with 4 principals, the most recent being Mrs Hay and my memory of Mrs hay's 1st day in Primary one was she wanted to move the water tray and I actually shouted at her STOP but too late she pushed it and it fell so we had a very wet teacher!!  I will also never forget how to spell PUMPKIN when Mrs hay took the homework books home her mum pointed out that pumpkin had a second P!! 

I'll probably be thrown out before I retire!  Hopefully my little granddaughter will be coming next year to P1 so that may be a very challenging year!