Latest Covid 19 update from Headteacher 4.1.21

4th January 2021

Dear parents,

First of all Happy New year! I hope you all had a safe Christmas and enjoyed your time with the family you managed to see.

I’m writing this to give you as many details as I can regarding the current situation with Covid 19.

The national picture is forever changing and goodness knows where we will be this time tomorrow!  Or even by tea time!!! I will keep you up to date with any changes as soon as I am aware.

I know that it is a terribly confusing and worrying time for many of you, and I have spent a lot of today talking with individual parents as well as staff and the Director of Education of Leicestershire County Council about various concerns. We will do anything we can to support any of you, so please contact us if you are unsure or need any help or guidance.

It’s imperative that you do not send your child to school if they, or anyone in your household is displaying symptoms of Covid 19, or if you have been contacted by track and trace. As I’m sure you are aware the new strain of the virus does transmit more easily than previously, so being on our guard and having a ‘better safe than sorry’ approach is vital.

Currently school will remain open to all children unless you are notified about individual classes. Leicestershire County Council have said today that all children, except for those classed as extremely clinically vulnerable, should attend school. For parents who choose to  not send children back because of safety concerns these will be classed as unauthorised and guidance given to schools is that we should not provide work via our on line platform for these children. Staff do not have the capacity to teach and provide feedback on pupils work from home at the same time. There will be guidance to websites from each team and a daily check in on seesaw.

We have been assured that our current risk assessments have everything in place to mitigate risk. Ventilation will be key so I strongly advise layers of clothing for your children, staff are doing the same! We have enhanced cleaning in place and surfaces are frequently cleaned.

We are in a position that if any teaching staff feel it necessary to follow union guidance about not attending work and working from home remotely, these classes will have to close and all learning move on line to seesaw. In the event of this happening your children will not have to self-isolate, this will only happen if bubbles/classes have to close due to Covid infection. If classes are closed due to staff not being in the building we do not currently have any capacity for children of key workers, but we are working on this.

Please be aware that we are getting information from the news as you are regarding the national situation. If schools are closed nationally the keyworker provision will be available as soon as we can reasonably organise it. It would be very helpful if you are a key worker and would require a school place that you inform the school office as soon as possible so we can try to do some forward planning if this does occur.

I am aware that there is a news conference tonight at 8pm and if there are any changes to national guidance these will need to be followed. I’ll write to you tomorrow if there are!

Once again I’d like to thank you for your continued support in this difficult time. It’s not easy for any of us, staff are working tirelessly to make sure there is as little disruption to learning as possible. If you have any questions please email me at Liz.powell@ashbyce.leics.sch.uk

Kind regards

L Powell

Headteacher

 

Please click here to download a PDF version of the above Covid-19 Headteacher's letter (4.1.21)

04 Jan 2021

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