Headteachers letter 4.1.21
Dorothy Gardner Centre
Mary Paterson Nursery School
Queens Park Children’s Centre
4th January 2021
Dear Parents/Carers,
PLEASE READ THIS LETTER TO THE END – IMPORTANT INFORMATION ENCLOSED
I hope that you are well and have had a peaceful and safe holiday so far.
Yesterday, the National Education Union met to discuss the reopening of schools in England. SAGE has advised the Government that schools should move to remote learning in order to help reduce the rate of spread of the Covid 19 virus. As a result the NEU has advised members that it is unsafe for staff to attend the workplace at present.
Therefore I have taken the difficult decision that from Wednesday 6th January the school will be open for critical workers and vulnerable children only. For all other children we will move to remote teaching from this date. The nursery will be open from 9am until 3pm. Children attending will come for their usual session whether that is FT, morning or afternoon. We ask that children are picked up and dropped off on time, as we have a limited rota of staff and for safeguarding purposes we cannot open and close the door throughout the session.
We anticipate that this closure will last up until the 18th January, when the evidence will be reviewed.
Vulnerable Children
We will contact those families of children as identified as ‘vulnerable’ on Monday 4th January to notify you.
Children of Critical Workers
If parents fall into one of the following categories, and in the case of two parent families -both parents, they are identified as a child of a ‘Critical worker’ and your child can attend school from Wednesday 6th January 2021. Please contact the school office to let us know if your child falls into the Critical worker category by 12:00 on Tuesday 5th of January. If we do not hear from you I will assume that you do not require a place for your child. Critical workers are defined as follows:
Critical workers
Parents whose work is critical to the coronavirus (COVID-19) response include those who work in health and social care and in other key sectors outlined in the following sections.
Health and social care
This includes, but is not limited to, doctors, nurses, midwives, paramedics, social workers, care workers, and other frontline health and social care staff including volunteers; the support and specialist staff required to maintain the UK’s health and social care sector; those working as part of the health and social care supply chain, including producers and distributors of medicines and medical and personal protective equipment.
Education and childcare
This includes:
• childcare
• support and teaching staff
• social workers
• specialist education professionals who must remain active during the coronavirus (COVID-19) response to deliver this approach
Key public services
This includes:
• those essential to the running of the justice system
• religious staff
• charities and workers delivering key frontline services
• those responsible for the management of the deceased
• journalists and broadcasters who are providing public service broadcasting
Local and national government
This only includes:
-
those administrative occupations essential to the effective delivery of the coronavirus (COVID-19) response
-
or delivering essential public services, such as the payment of benefits, including in government agencies and arm's length bodies
Food and other necessary goods
This includes those involved in food:
• production
• processing
• distribution
• sale and delivery
• as well as those essential to the provision of other key goods
Public safety and national security
This includes:
• police and support staff
• Ministry of Defence civilians
• contractor and armed forces personnel (those critical to the delivery of key defence and national security outputs and essential to the response to the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak)
• fire and rescue service employees (including support staff)
• National Crime Agency staff
• those maintaining border security, prison and probation staff and other national security roles, including those overseas
Transport
This includes those who will keep the air, water, road and rail passenger and freight transport modes operating during the coronavirus (COVID-19) response, including those working on transport systems through which supply chains pass.
Utilities, communication and financial services
This includes:
• staff needed for essential financial services provision (including but not limited to workers in banks, building societies and financial market infrastructure)
• the oil, gas, electricity and water sectors (including sewerage)
• information technology and data infrastructure sector and primary industry supplies to continue during the coronavirus (COVID-19) response
• key staff working in the civil nuclear, chemicals, telecommunications (including but not limited to network operations, field engineering, call centre staff, IT and data infrastructure, 999 and 111 critical services)
• postal services and delivery
• payments providers
• waste disposal sectors
If you have questions regarding your eligibility under the above criteria, you will be able to contact the school from Monday 4th January.
Free school meals
The government are not providing vouchers for free school meal children. The school will be providing a packed lunch that can be picked up from outside the school office from 1pm. If you are eligible for free school meals you will need to email Michele on Wednesday 6th January 2021 to let us know that we should prepare a lunch.
When collecting a lunch please make sure that you adhere to social distancing rules.
Remote Learning
From Wednesday 6th January we will be providing remote learning via our twitter page @qpfed and our Instagram page @qpfederation. Where you will find stories, games, cooking and many more activities by our staff team.
Thank you in advance for your ongoing support and cooperation. I wish we were all returning as usual to school, but if we continue to work together in partnership, I hope that we can keep the community safe for all.
Yours sincerely,
Mr Commins
Executive Headteacher