Dear Parents and Carers,

I am writing to inform you that on Sunday afternoon we were contacted by a member of staff who had just tested positive for Covid.

The member of staff concerned had taught our Key Worker and Priority children on Friday 10th July. However, they had not been in College since the 3rd July when they had also taught these children.

Public Health England have been contacted.

The member of staff presented in College as asymptomatic and therefore, according to Public Health England, presents as a lower risk since they were not coughing or sneezing.

The member of staff had only taught Key Worker and Vulnerable children and had no contact with any other student group.

The parents and carers of all the students they taught are currently being contacted to advise that they now need to go into isolation for 14 days and not return to College this week. As different student groups are taught separately from each other, and have different breaks and lunchtimes, only those students taught by this member of staff will be asked to self isolate.

To reassure you, the Year 10 sessions, Year 12 sessions, Key Stage 3 1:1 and Year 10 1:1 sessions and Keyworker/Priority student sessions, all take place in different areas of the College with students not allowed to go from one area to the other. Therefore, only those students taught by this member of staff need to self-isolate and all those potentially affected have now been contacted.

The member of staff has also given us a list of the staff with whom they had socially distanced conversations with during the day. According to PHE, unless these staff show symptoms, or the conversations were face to face, then these staff are able to return to work where required on Monday. However as a precaution, we will be advising them to remain at home for the week.

To further reassure you, given the range of measures put in place to help keep students safe, transmission within school is far less likely than when out and about within the community, for instance, when using shops, parks, skatepark or the beach. 

For students we have:

• staggered starts, 
• regular handwashing, 
• supervised staggered breaks and lunches, 
• one way systems, 
• areas for different groups to socialise, 
• regular cleaning of equipment such as chairs, tables, PE kit, keyboards between each student use, 
• well ventilated rooms, 
• small student groups which we keep as consistent as we possibly can given the numbers of keyworker children varies daily
• Year 10 and 12 teaching groups are by invite only so that groupings can be managed
• students are supervised by staff between lessons to maintain social distancing as far as possible. 
• staff and students are briefed each day at the start of the sessions to remind them about the importance of the safety measures in place

We are pleased to report that the member of staff is feeling well.

If you have any worries or concerns please do not hesitate to get in touch with us.

Regards,

Andrew Davis - Principal