To kick off Term 4 with a Yaaaaaaaas, the Nayland College PRIDE group organised ‘Yaaaaassify week’ to acknowledge the wide community of LGBTQ+ students at Nayland and in Aotearoa.

To Yaaaaaasify is to make something brighter, more inclusive, and more fun! While many students at Nayland are part of the LGBTQ+ community or are allies, school can still be a tough place to be different.

We wanted to make sure all students felt safe and accepted by showering the school in colour and by making our kura just a little more faaaaaabulous! In doing so we hope to normalise support of our LGBTQ+ community and shine some cheer on our diverse learners. 

The week began with tutor classes opting in for a Yaaaaaasification Pack that was filled with flags, stickers, badges, rainbow chains, and colouring-in to decorate their classrooms and belongings – all paid for with funds raised by our PRIDE group through tasty bake sales and our now famous NayCol PRIDE Badges! 

On Wednesday and Thursday in tutor time, students had coloured card to make rainbow chains inside which they could write messages of support, and the week concluded with a Kahoot that had students learning about our Rainbow Community’s history both as a nation and as a school. 

Aotearoa can be celebrated for its long-standing support of diversity and as such proudly stands on the right side of history. So too can Nayland College, which received world-wide acclaim for starting the group NAGS (Nayland Alliance of Gays and Straights) founded by Tabby Besley who went on to be honoured for her work by the late Queen Elizabeth at Buckingham Palace before starting the national charity InsideOUT. 

Nayland PRIDE welcomes anyone to attend our weekly meetings on Tuesdays in Room 5 at lunchtime 😊