From Our School Leaders

Welcome Back To Term 4

We hope that over the holidays you have been able to have a restful break. Lockdown holidays are nowhere near as exciting as holidays we’ve had in the past. It was nice to have a few nice days – perfect weather for picnics. Whatever you did, we hope you enjoyed it.

The Return - Staggered Starts

Term 4 sees us returning to school in a new format - a staggered start. As mums, we can appreciate that this might present challenges for our parents. As it is authorised by DET we are going to forge ahead with the planned return. We are glad it is only for a couple of weeks. A coloured copy of the timetable for each grade level is included in the Diary Dates section of this newsletter. If you are concerned about dropping off your children to multiple sites, please contact Sue or Nicole to discuss.

All staff are to return to onsite work on Tuesday 26th October. Until then we remain in the mix of working from home and onsite supervision, while delivering Remote and Flexible Learning to all students. We are really looking forward to getting back to being a workforce in one place again, and also for the return of our students to these empty classrooms. Schools are hollow places without the hum of kids.

Three Vs: Ventilation, Vaccination and Vital COVID-Safe Steps

We are sharing the 3Vs diagram from DET outlining the COVID-safe procedures in schools. They are conducting audits of all school ventilation and air quality; we have no timelines around this as yet.

We have put the following practices into place to make our school as safe as possible:

• opening our louvered windows (main building) and external doors daily (weather permitting of course)
• conducted another COVID audit
• attended a School Closure course, should our school become an exposure site
• divided our school staff rooms accordingly, for when staff return
• made staff aware of vaccination requirements

As you know it has been mandated that all people working in educational settings be fully vaccinated.

From DET:

The Victorian Chief Health Officer has determined that COVID-19 vaccination will be mandatory for staff who work in schools. This includes principals, teachers, administration and education support staff, including casual relief teachers (CRTs), pre-service teachers, and Out of School Hours Care staff.

All staff who work in schools will be required to have a first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine by 18 October 2021 or be able to produce evidence of a vaccination booking within the following seven days.

All staff are required to be fully vaccinated by 29 November 2021 unless a medical exemption applies. They will be required to show evidence of their vaccination status.

Further details in relation to processes for checking vaccination status, and in relation to other adults attending onsite will be provided soon. Vaccination is not mandatory for students.

Cancelled And Postponed Activities

We are in discussions about events for Term 4 and how to best manage re-booking, refunds and re-scheduling. Things in the mix are Grade 5/6 Camp, Swimming P - 4, Foundation excursion and Year 6 Graduation. As you can imagine, it is challenging negotiating events in the future. In some cases, we are just waiting. 

School Works And Maintenance

A few projects have been completed in our school over the past few weeks.

Our shade shelter near the kitchen garden has had a complete transformation.  It has been re-roofed, painted and will soon be concreted.  This will provide another outdoor space for students to work in once they return to school. 

Lights across the school have been checked and some missing covers replaced for safety. All exit lights have been serviced, and the breezeway lights have also been replaced. 

Our main corridor floor has finally been fully re-polished.  The floor had many layers of wax over it after many years of use. It has been a long-staged process but was finally finished over the holidays.  It almost looks new! The main toilet floors have also had an extensive clean. We have tried to use the time that the children haven’t been here to catch up on some maintenance needs.

We will also be applying to add another shade sail to the school.  All schools have been given the opportunity to get another shade sail to encourage outdoor learning where possible. These sails cannot be placed over play areas. We have chosen to put the sail at the back of the Prep room and will source seating arrangements there at a later date.  It’s a very under-utilised space at the moment.

2022 Prep Transition Begins

Next week we start the process, once again, of inducting the newest members into our wonderful school. Our first session for our 2022 Foundation students is on Friday 15th October, 2.30-3.15pm. This will be conducted online. We are hopeful that we will be able to conduct other sessions face-to-face later in the term.

SUE HARTLEY AND NICOLE RHEUMER

Scoresby Primary School Leaders