Dear Parents and Carers,
Many of you will have watched the Prime Minister’s speech last night where an initial, conditional plan was revealed regarding the phased return of certain year groups back into school. Parents and teachers may have been surprised by some of the year groups selected by the government, as the first ones back. It was made clear that a return to school would only be possible if the rates of Covid 19 infections continue to decline and there will be much watching, waiting and preparing before firm decisions are made about the return of larger groups of children to school.
School has been issued with guidance to manage the very low numbers we have in school and this guidance has been followed. Thankfully, many key workers have been able to educate children from home and this has helped to keep us all safe here at school.
There has been no change to guidance issued to schools and the clear message is that it is safer for children to be educated at home at this present time. We will continue to provide work for your child and endeavour to manage distance learning as best we can. We value your efforts to keep children and adults safe at this time and the support you are providing to your child.
We have, as yet, received no further guidance from the DFE about how to manage a phased return of pupils but we expect this to reach schools very soon. We will need very clear guidance on how to manage social distancing and we know that you wouldn’t want children to return to school unless procedures to keep adults and pupils safe were effective. There will need to be certain conditions met before greater numbers of pupils can return to school and we all need to abide by the social distancing measures insisted upon by national advisers and leaders. We expect that these measures will need to be followed for some time.
We will keep you informed of the plan for Duke Street Primary School, which will be worked out carefully over time and with regard for the particular needs of our school community. We will inform you of any decisions made as soon as we can. In the meantime, may I thank you for your patience and consideration. Please be assured that we are working hard each day to provide education as well as manage the safety of pupils and adults at this time.
Mr Kidd
