Welcome Back to Term 3

While I had anticipated welcoming our students and staff back to school last week with a refreshed focus on our teaching and learning programs, disappointingly we have had to commence Term 3 with an even more stringent focus on our Belmore School Health and Hygiene Minimum Standards of Care. Entry to Belmore School is now conditional upon a temperature check measuring under 37.5°C along with the requirement for all adults to wear a face mask at all times throughout all areas of the school. While it is not mandated for Belmore School students to wear a face mask, we will support those students who do wish to wear one to ensure they are wearing and storing it correctly. The highest standard of hand hygiene, respiratory hygiene and surface cleaning along with our best efforts to implement physical distancing of 1.5 metres have remained a priority for us all. The Department has continued to fund an additional cleaner throughout the day to clean high contact points and surface areas.

Attendance on-site

Student attendance on-site has reduced as parents and carers are making their own considered decision as to whether or not it is safe for their child to leave their home to attend school. To enable students staying at home to remain connected with Belmore and engaged in their learning, class teachers will contact parents and carers to arrange delivery of a home learning program. While this will be different to the program we provided in Term 2, as this time around our teachers are still onsite teaching their students attending school, we will do our best to ensure each student is provided with a range of relevant learning activities to be undertaken at home.

As I informed you in my BSC message on Tuesday it is important you are aware there may be ongoing staffing changes throughout this term. I take this opportunity to remind you that following the stay at home direction and waiting for COVID-19 testing results, means that an increased number of staff may be absent from school and for longer periods of time. As a school staff we have elected not to employ casual relief teachers and ES staff from a CRT Agency as they may not have a thorough understanding of our school context and generally do not know our students well. This means that at times students from different classes may be grouped together (especially as we are currently experiencing lower class sizes due to increased student absence) or classes may be taught by a different teacher or supported by alternate education support staff. Fortunately in a small school such as Belmore, our staff work closely together, and we all know all our students very well. While acknowledging this is not ideal and where possible trying to avoid this, we know that when staff are required to take personal leave due to illness or carer responsibilities, we can still ensure the Belmore School Health and Hygiene Minimum Standards are fully implemented and all students and staff are protected under the high standards we require.

I take this opportunity to remind all members of our school community (staff, parents/carers and students) of the importance to follow the Victorian Government direction to stay home and get tested at a coronavirus (COVID-19) testing facility if any of the following symptoms are experienced – fever, chills or sweats, cough, sore throat, shortness of breath, runny nose, loss of smell or taste. This is vitally important to keeping our Belmore School community safe.

School Playground Upgrade

The upgrade of our school playground continues to be a School Council priority. Our working party is currently liaising with Jeavons Landscape Architects to review the design we developed in relative haste last year when preparing to apply for the DET Inclusive Schools Grant. The Victorian Government has now released a $20 million Minor Capital Works Fund for DET schools as part of their $2.7 billion Building Works stimulus package. We will be submitting an application for our playground upgrade to be funded through this program.

Whether it be through provision of a grant or locally raised funds we are committed to provide a 21st century outdoor education facility for all our students to access for both recreational and learning development. Please email me if you have any suggestions or contacts which may help develop this scope of work.

Belmore School Newsletter

Issue 7 · 24 Jul 2020

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