CIP - Community Involvement Program which is compulsory for Secondary students. Details can be found here, Thank you, sx4 for sharing and  here.

Ever wonder how to fulfil the 100 hours of CIP requirements? If left to the school, it's very difficult to reach even half of that. But through the student's initation, clocking 100 hours isn't that daunting. Mine managed more than 140 hours.

Having seen 2 kids thru the dreaded PSLEs and coming through unscathed, I'm now able to look back (though not fondly) and share with parents how we cope as a family.

A - Aiming for A*s, of course. Most schools would've asked the kids to set a goal at the beginning of the year and review them at mid-year. You could too, and stick it somewhere visible in the room.

B - Busy. You bet they'll be busy with loads of practice papers assigned by the school. So, spare them the additional work even if you had already bought extra papers.

Though some of us had committed some forgiveable booboos at the recent auctions,  I hope that all participants had their fun and seen their kitties grow. Most certainly must thank chief for so efficiently managing the auction, and of course for the generous items and awards. Can't believe he does it manually! 

So, after participating in auctions 12 to 14, I've learned some tricks to share with all. Before the auction:

1) Size up your competition, by checking their kitty. How to do that?

Just to summarise what we did/should've done.

1. Inform your neighbourhood police post.

DH called to inform them but forgot to leave his name with them. Our nice men-in-blue called back to reconfirm.  Kudos to them.

2. Signup for mail retention service at the post office.

Paid $21.40 before departure, indicated on the form that I'll collect mail from the MP PO upon return. This was also confirmed with the staff there. Well, this morning, dh went down to MP PO to collect our mail, and....the nincompoops there said our mail will be redelivered from Katong PO tomorrow. Looks like our PO aren't sure of their own processes/forms.

3. Inform your newspaper delivery agent.

Congratulations to all kids who've been selected. As my son has benefited greatly the last 3 years, I would like to share his experiences to parents who're having doubts.