Important message for next week #3 - Moortown Primary School, Leeds

You’ll be aware that last night the Prime Minister confirmed that the five tests upon which the easing of lockdown depended have been met. As a result, primary schools will begin to open schools more widely.

The response to this from the Director of Children and Families, Leeds City Council, is:

The Leeds position is unchanged. It is important for children to resume their education so they can once again learn and interact with their peers but that this is done in such a way that the risks to pupils, staff and parents are minimised as much as possible. We know that every school is different and your offer to pupils will vary according to your unique set of circumstances. We will continue to support [headteacher] decisions about the timing and level of phased return for children to school that are based on the comprehensive risk assessments you have been diligently undertaking.

The position in Sphere Federation schools is unchanged, too. We’ll continue to prioritise the growing numbers of children from key workers (as more people are expected back to work, there’s more demand for places in school) and children who may be vulnerable in some way. After this, we’ll look at increasing numbers of children in Reception, Year 1 and Year 6, and we’ll aim to balance this by considering safety in school and the needs of children and families in other year groups.

At Moortown Primary and at Scholes (Elmet) Primary, the number of pupils next week is likely to be over three times as many as on a typical ‘lockdown week’ so far.

There are two more important messages for today.

Agreeing a place for your child

Only come to school if we’ve confirmed there’s a place for your child. Please note we only have a small amount of room for manoeuvre. We can’t allow more children without carefully checking the numbers we have already: each of the ‘bubbles’ can only take so many without undermining safety.

Social distancing

This morning, school leaders across the federation have agreed the following course of action if we have concerns about social distancing:

School leaders have prepared an extensive risk assessment to make sure that our children and staff stay safe in school from Tuesday 02 June 2020. Without our school community (pupils, parents / carers and staff) all adhering to the government guidance on social distancing, the measures we take in school will be undermined.

The policy has been prompted by concerns raised by parents and staff that others may not always have been following social distancing.

The government’s message about social contact is changing, but we will always aim to follow the current message in school, and equally expect families to do so out of school. This is especially the case if your child is attending school.

From Monday in England, you’ll be able to meet in groups of up to six people from different households outside as long as you remain two metres apart. This means that parents and carers must ensure their child stays two metres away from other people – children hugging and hand-holding, games like tig, tackling in football should all be avoided. The only people to enter a home should be members of that household.

If a child says something that indicates they or someone in their household has not followed government guidelines, we’ll do some or all of the following:

continue a conversation with the child in an informal, friendly way – this will help us to gain a better understanding and (hopefully) reassure ourselves that social distancing has not been undermined (we won’t ask any leading questions)
contact the child’s parents / carers to discuss what the child has said and to clarify the situation
isolate the child away from the rest of the children in their ‘bubble’ while we wait for more clarification from the child or their parents / carers

Equally, if an adult says something that indicates another family may not have followed government guidelines, we’ll follow this up.

Ultimately, we may have to ask a parent / carer to collect their child from school and they may lose their child’s place in the bubble. This is because our schools are close to capacity in terms of numbers in bubbles and there is a waiting list of other families wanting a place for their child.

We’d do this reluctantly, but this would be fair to other families in school who are following the guidance, many of whom are key workers and have less choice about whether their child should attend school, too. This is for the safety of all.

The final decision on whether a child can be in school safely lies with the Head of Federation.

Read all the key information about opening schools more widely.