Celebrating Aspire Baldivis’s First Anniversary!
The 1st of May celebrated Aspire Early Education and Kindergarten Baldivis’s first anniversary! Aspire Baldivis was the first centre to open outside of Victoria, which was a very exciting prospect. Since then, the centre has grown and thrived, with a second Baldivis centre joining Aspire in late 2024, and another Western Australian centre set to open in late 2025. Let’s take a trip down memory lane and see some of our favourite memories from the past year!
This week, the centre went all-out to celebrate its first birthday. Centre Manager Stacy spent hours decorating for and organising the event. She even baked a beautiful cake in Aspire’s colours!
During the party, guests had the opportunity to add to a shared sand jar art piece. The empty jar was filled with differently-coloured sand, with each colour representing a different group. White for the community, purple for families, pink for the children and green for the educators. Guests were encouraged to fill the jar up in their corresponding colour. By the end of the day, the jar was filled up with layers of brightly coloured sand. It was a great way to visually see how the entire Aspire community can come together to make something beautiful.
Before the centre officially opened, we held a community open day event! We opened the doors for families and the wider Baldivis community to see the centre for the first time. Many community members attended the family-friendly event, with the team showcasing Aspire’s care and community focus. The kids had a great time with the petting farm, amazing fairy face painters, and especially meeting Elsa and Spiderman!
Overall, it was an amazing event that really brought Aspire to the forefront of the Baldivis community.
Ngaru Pou
The centre had a wonderful visit from Ngaru Pou last year for a Māori cultural incursion. Ngaru Pou is a youth-led Māori cultural group dedicated to sharing its culture, traditions, music, and dance with the community. The group sang some traditional children’s songs, as well as taught some Poi dancing and Haka. They even performed some of the children’s favourite Disney songs! After the performance, they invited the children to get a temporary traditional Ta Moko (Māori tattoo).
The incursion showed the children at the centre some of the beautiful customs and traditions of Māori culture.
Millyaan Aboriginal Services
Aspire Baldivis has built a strong relationship with Cyril from Milliyaan Aboriginal Services.
Cyril held a Welcome to Country and Smoking Ceremony at Aspire Baldivis when the centre first opened. He has a deeper connection to Baldivis, as his grandparents were the first Aboriginal family to settle in the 1960’s Medina development.
The centre loves monthly visits from Cyril, who shares about Indigenous cultures, history and the Noongar language. The children are lucky to listen to stories from Cyril, passed down to him from his Elders. As well as this, they learn about Australian animals, plants and their importance to First Nations Peoples.
Aspire Baldivis’s first anniversary is an exciting milestone, and we can’t wait to see them continue to grow and thrive! Learn more about Aspire’s first Western Australian centre at the links below:
