COVIDSafe principles at NMPS

From Sarah, Principal

Now that we have the full School Operations Guide, I wanted to share some important information about our return to school and the COVID Safe principles that will be in place for NMPS until further notice. 

Morning Drop off and Afternoon Pick up Procedures

Gates will be opened from 8:45 am until 9 am with students entering/exiting through the designated year level gates. If you have children in multiple year levels, all children are able to enter at the youngest child’s gate.  Once again, I would like to remind families that parents are strongly encouraged to drop their child/ren off at the gate and allow the child/ren to walk to their rooms independently. Parents of younger students may choose to walk their child/ren to the outside of their classroom. We ask that if parents are entering the school ground that they comply with physical distancing and wear a face mask. 

Parents/carers are asked not to gather on-site or enter any school building and should leave the school as soon as possible before 9 am. 

Please rest assured that once your child has entered the school ground, they are safe as they are supervised by members of our staff. All students will finish school at 3:30 pm. Students will be walked outside of the classroom with their teacher to meet their parents/carers. If you have multiple children, please arrange a meeting point with all children near the youngest child’s gate prior to the school day beginning. 

To ensure consistency with physical distancing and density measures, unfortunately, students and families will not be permitted to congregate at the school after 3:30 pm.

QR Codes and Checking-in

QR code checks-in are required by all visitors to the school site and all parents who enter school buildings, including corridors, when on the school site. QR codes are not required to be used by parents who come onto the school grounds for drop off and pick up. 

Please remember, parents, are not permitted to enter school buildings, including corridors, at drop-off and pick-up times. 

If you need to visit the main office, we ask that you also sign in via the Compass Kiosk. Please ensure you adhere to our density limits of 1 person per 4 square metres in this space. 

Essential Visitors Only

Non-essential visitors are not permitted on the school site for this period. This means we cannot proceed with our school tours or our parent helper program. All school events, gatherings, and assemblies will either be deferred or held remotely. 

Communication

At NMPS, we welcome open lines of communication with families. Due to the current climate, unfortunately, it is not as easy to have informal conversations with teachers before/after school. If you would like to meet with your child’s teacher, please either email or phone the school in advance to make an appointment at a mutually convenient time. 

These meetings will need to be held remotely at this point in time. 

COVID Safe Activities

There will be some changes at school for your children that we would like you to be aware of. Reducing mixing between groups of students works to limit the number of students potentially identified as close contacts in the event of an exposure at school, therefore we will limit mixing between different groups across the school where possible. Interschool sport is not permitted at this time. However, outdoor and indoor physical activity is permitted. Where possible we will move activities outdoors, weather permitting. 

Incursions are not permitted at this time. Excursions are only permitted with students from a single school only which means any planned excursion may need to be either deferred or modified. Collection of student contact details will be required on excursions. Where possible we will increase fresh air flow into indoor spaces and we will maximise the use of outdoor learning areas, weather permitted. 

Health and Safety Advice

Our school has a COVID Safe Plan that sets out the approach for managing safety risks in the school. Our COVID Safe Plan has been updated to align with the changes and advice set out in the current Operations Guide. Our nurse, Jen, will continue to send out detailed health advice to all families, however, we remind all families to stay home when unwell and get tested. 

We appreciate this is a lot of information for families and we continue to appreciate the support of our NMPS community in respecting these guidelines. If you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to reach out.