Students are more than eager to wear their pyjamas this coming Monday as a way to give back to those in need, with St Francis De Sales’ Mini Vinnies team leading the charge.
Spearheaded by a group of senior students, who are also the primary school’s social justice group, the upcoming pyjama day runs under the banner of ‘Keep Cosy and Help Others Keep Clean’, with students who want to wear their cosy clothes encouraged to donate toiletries.
Giuliana Failoa, the school’s extra-curricular coordinator and the Mini Vinnies’ facilitator, said that the idea was borne out of the children’s experience with the Vinnies’ soup and chat night.
“That night, a number of guest speakers came in to speak to us about how they help the homeless or those less fortunate,” she said.
“One of the speakers spoke about the Lynbrook Community Centre and how they had those who were homeless coming in to have showers, but one of the problems was that they didn’t have toiletries.”
Afterwards, the Mini Vinnies group decided on three actions for the remainder of the school term, which included the donations collected on the soup and chat night, over $500, to be donated to the Vinnies Dandenong Tutoring Program.
The second action was for the group to join the Houses of Parliament program to make origami houses and display them in school, and to collect toiletries for the Lynbrook Community Centre.
Giuliana reflected that while she supervises the group, the idea to put forward a pyjama day as a way to encourage the other students to make a donation had come directly from the Mini Vinnies, an idea they were ecstatic to present to the school’s executive team.
“I took them to another conference, and on the ride back, they said to me, ‘what about a pyjama day?’” Giuliana said.
“At the same time, they all came up with the slogan, and when we arrived at the school, two students volunteered to pitch it to the principal.
“I was late to the meeting, but when I walked in there, there was just excitement everywhere; the principal and deputy principal were just as excited as the kids.”
Further specifics on the day soon blossomed as the kids began organising the day’s process; however, for Giuliana, it’s the message of kindness that leaves the biggest impact, highlighting the importance of these attitudes at a young age.
“I think it just gives them compassion, you know? It’s hard to put yourself in another person’s shoes,” she said.
“Especially so when you haven’t experienced anything like it, so it teaches them a level of compassion, to care for other people and not just for themselves.”
She added that it teaches a sense of “obligation” to those in the community who “don’t have it as well as we do”, and to most of all, just give back.
As someone who volunteers with Vinnie’s soup vans, seeing the children under her guidance take the same steps was heartwarming, especially since she can feel that their actions are something that she thinks will stick with them for the time to come.
“I really hope that it’s something they will continue to do, that it’ll be something that’s part of them, I mean, you can see the passion these kids have,” she said.
“It doesn’t worry them that they’re giving up their play time or whatever, but it’s to help.
“It makes me feel really good, you know, for me to be getting that message across to them.”
The upcoming pyjama day and its accumulated donations will be organised and packaged by the school, as well as the Mini Vinnies students, and sent to the Lynbrook Community Centre.
