23 Mar 2020
Dear Parents and Carers,
By now you would have seen media reports following this morning's announcement by NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian. The New South Wales Premier Gladys Berejiklian is urging parents to reconsider sending their children to school. "For practical reasons, we in NSW will be encouraging parents to keep their children at home". Classrooms across the state will remain open for the next three weeks until the Easter holiday break. However, Berejiklian says the advice from health authorities has shifted to say that children should be kept at home.
SPS will continue to operate as directed by the NSW Department of Education. We support the Premier’s advice to parents and continue to make suitable arrangements for students to learn at home. Where parents are unable to provide supervision or they are essential workers, schools will remain open at this stage.
In light of these new guidelines and recommendations there are a few additional changes to our school operating procedures.
As of tomorrow Tuesday 24.03.2020
*STUDENT DROP OFF: as close to 9:10am as possible. Staff will greet students at the gate as they arrive at school. Parents are asked not to enter the school in the morning and quickly conduct their drop off ‘goodbyes’ before arriving at the 3 open gate entry points. (Hunter Street near the office building, the ‘Enter to Learn’ gate or the Elizabeth Street gate near the COLA).
*STUDENT AFTERNOON PICK UP: Parents will need to wait at the large Elizabeth Street gate area (closest to the church/where the big gum tree is), the Hunter Street gate near the Office or the ‘Enter to Learn’ gate. Please maintain your own social distancing during this time. Staff will be at each gate to see students safely to a parent/carer. Please DO NOT use the Elizabeth Street COLA gate (Bus Area) for afternoon pickup. This will allow us to limit the congestion for the students catching buses home.
Parents are asked to tell their child which gate to go to in the afternoons for pickup.
If you are unsure they will remember, please attach a note to their school bag for teachers to refer to in the afternoons.
*Parents collecting students via car are asked to use a quick ‘collect and go’ process so other parents may also collect quickly.
*Bus students will continue to meet under the COLA.
*Band practice is now postponed until further notice.
Parents are asked to NOT enter the school premises unless coming to collect a child from the office. If parents/carers are unwell please do not come into the school. A quick phone call to the office and we will assist you in collecting your child or help you with your enquiry.
A timely reminder also that there is NO access to classrooms for parents during this time, this includes before, during or after school.
We have held off making these changes for as long as possible but to allow for more social distancing measures and to reduce the contact of our school students, staff and community we are now moving to the new procedures.
We are working through the 'online learning' provisions and training with staff on how to use the online resources and platforms. In the short term, the school can provide booklets of work, along with links to websites and online learning activities for those students who have access.
Students who are at school today will be given their work packs to take home. For those not at school today, parents/carers are welcome to collect booklets from outside the Hunter Street Parsonage gates from 10.00 am tomorrow. The packs are labelled with the child’s name.
Please follow the 2 metre social distancing guidelines while you are collecting these items. If you are unable to keep your child at home, please ensure they are only sent to school if they are well.
My executive team and I will regularly meet over the coming days to evaluate situations and questions as they arise. I will continue to update families regarding school management procedures and practices as changes arise.
In the current environment our staff are working with great dedication to adapt to new conditions, finalise hard copy and online learning material and communicate with students and parents. However, we would greatly appreciate parents and carers accessing our Facebook page, school App, and website.
Please be considerate of our office staff at this time. We all appreciate your calmness and patience at the moment. There are a lot of questions and we are working to give the most up to date information as it comes to hand. When decisions are made or information received, I will update families. Therefore, please resist phoning our office staff with questions they are unlikely to be able to answer and limit phone calls to our school for urgent matters only.
Please keep yourself informed by regularly checking the school app, Facebook, website and your emails.
We appreciate your ongoing support in these ever-changing and unprecedented times.
Deanne Brown
Principal