The North East Catholic Schools' Kahui Ako is holding it's first ever Cultural Festival this month.

St Joseph's School is part of a Kahui Ako/Community of Learning with St Alban's Catholic School, St Joseph's Rangiora, Marian College and St Bede's College. The Kahui Ako is organising a Cultural Festival for the 5 schools, to be held at Marian College on with Kapa Haka, Pasifika and Filipino Cultural Groups from each school performing. 

There will be two performances, the first at 12pm, and the second at 6pm. The afternoon performance will have an audience of children from the three primary schools, as well as all the performers. The evening performance will be available for parents and whānau to be the audience. St Joseph's will have Kapa Haka groups and the Filipino Cultural Group performing.

Our school has more than 100 students involved in Kapa Haka, which is fantastic. In order to make space for so many students, we run two kapa haka groups each week, with our tutors Whaea Tania and Matua Willie. For this cultural festival, the Ngāhau group will take part in the afternoon performance. This group is made up of mostly new members, who have never done Kapa Haka before. The Whakataetae group, who has more experience, will perform in the evening. Our Filipino Cultural Group will take part in both performances.

Notices on HERO have been sent out this week to the parents of students in our cultural groups, to find out who is available and how many whānau members would like to attend. If you have a child in these groups, please check HERO and fill out the Google Form as soon as possible.

If you have problems with this, or have any questions, please contact Melissa Clease: melissa.clease@stjopapa.school.nz