Friday Afternoon Childcare

Dear parents/carers,

 

This is a plea to you to help and support each other across school.

 

As you know we restructured our timetabled teaching week to enable us to manage the many varied and significant ongoing challenges in school, as a result of Covid.  The changes to our timetabled teaching week has ensured that we can provide all staff with their weekly PPA on a Friday afternoon.  It is a legal requirement that they have PPA.  Previously this was covered by other staff in school on different days throughout the week.

 

We offered to provide childcare to those who really need it on a Friday afternoon, as we recognised the need to support our families, whilst managing the intense challenges of running school during Covid.

 

The childcare is provided by one member of our support staff per year group.  We are not able to mix year groups for obvious reasons.  The free childcare is therefore limited in number as there is one member of staff per year group.    

 

We have had 2306 days of pupil absence as a result of Covid.  Due to household

  isolations, bubble isolations or positive tests.

 

We have had 238 days of staff absence as a result of Covid.  Due to household isolations, bubble isolations or positive tests.  

 

This demonstrates the extent of the staffing challenge we have been managing every single day.  But it also shows how challenging it would have been to provide staff with their legal entitlement to PPA, had we not restructured our week.  As organising cover with this level of absence would not have been possible. 

 

How you help us to help everyone in our school community

We have many key worker families and also many families with less support around them than others.  We have no childcare places left in some year groups and have had to turn away some families who desperately need the childcare.  Meanwhile we are led to believe that not everyone whose children are accessing a place currently need to do so.  I would also like to remind you that the provision on Friday afternoon is childcare only and not teacher-led learning.  Children who do not attend site on a Friday afternoon are given the same home learning to complete as those who remain in school.

 

We appreciate the huge support from so many of you in helping us all manage the difficult and ongoing challenges of Covid.  So it would be much appreciated if each and every one of you accessing the childcare could consider if you could manage without it, therefore freeing up a place for someone who desperately does.

 

Thank you for your support for each other and for us as a school.  I am sure we are all looking forward to the day when life will be easier for us all.  It will come.  But until then, if we can work together, we would very much appreciate it.

 

Thank you 

 

Kate Byrne