Kia ora koutou - Dear Parents and Whanau,

As you may be aware the Prime Minister has announced that schools will be fully open on Monday 18th May. The aim of this letter is to outline what school will look like at Alert Level 2.

The key Public Health approach is to minimise the risk that someone gets infected in the first place, and second to ensure we can identify and contact anyone who has been in close contact with that person. Under Alert Level 2, any students and staff who are unwell must stay at home. 

‘Bubble’ isolation does not continue at Alert Level 2. As such, all students and staff will return to their classes as ‘normal’. There will be no restrictions on the movement of students and staff between classrooms or at break times. Playground and shared P.E. equipment will now be accessible by different classes providing hand washing and drying continues. 

To reduce contact tracing issues, parents are not to enter school wherever possible. The exception to this will be parents of Year 0-2 students who may enter the gate near the Te Akonga block; names of parents will be recorded for contact tracing purposes. Where possible, parents and carers are to email or phone the school office rather than enter the office in person. 

The Hall gate will be the second entrance/exit available for students. Both the Te Akonga gate and Hall gate will have a gazebo for shelter and hand sanitizer available. Normal school opening time will apply. Years 3 to 8 students can be collected between 2:30pm and 2:45pm from the Hall gate. To reduce congestion at the gate please let your child’s teacher know your collection time. The staff car park adjacent to  the Hall will be coned off as a space where parents for Year 3 - 8 students can wait and maintain sensible spacing. Buses will be running as normal with the addition of hand sanitizer being available for students on entering the vehicle. The before and after school SKIDS programme will be resuming when school returns. Please contact SKIDS directly or via the school office if you require that service.

Following Public Health advice for schools, no set distance between students will be maintained in classrooms, however they will be seated to avoid being physically too close and thereby avoid the ‘moist breath’ zone. Unlike measles or chickenpox, the coronavirus does not hang in the air but instead relies on microscopic spit particles landing on surfaces to spread. Students will be encouraged to cough or sneeze into their elbow, avoid touching their face and will frequently wash and dry their hands. 

Students are not to share food at break times and will need to bring their own water  bottle as the school fountain will be out of use. High touch surfaces in classrooms, toilets and around school will be cleaned and sanitized multiple times during the day.

In line with government advice on gatherings we will not be holding whole school assemblies, whanau time or timatanga until further notice and will inform whanau prior to commencing these activities. 

Students with a school Chromebook are asked to return them to the school office as soon as possible so that they may be checked in, cleaned and reallocated to classes. Please also return any reading materials previously sent home.

It is important that not just at school but at home, safe hygiene habits are practised by everyone. Dr Caroline McElnay, Director of Public Health has indicated:

“...it is important that parents fully support this approach by doing their bit - keeping children home if they are unwell and seeking medical advice about whether a child may need to be tested; and ensuring great hygiene practices at all times.”

If you have any questions about our health and safety plan, or have a child who might be vulnerable to serious illness and would like to discuss a plan for them, please contact the school. If your child has severe underlying health issues, please contact your GP for advice.

By Monday 18th May we will be in a position to welcome all students and staff back to school. Until then please continue to communicate with class teachers and enjoy the online home learning experiences available. 

Nga mihi,

Mark Ashcroft

Principal 

Kia ora koutou - Dear School Families - as you are aware the country will be moving to Alert Level 2. Following the Prime Minister's announcment on Monday we will know specifically when the School will be open to students. I will send a more detailed message to school families outlining details and expectations for returning to School at that point. Until then thank you for your ongoing engagement with home learning programmes provided by our creative staff. We look forward to hearing all kinds of exciting and fun stories from your wonderful tamariki when school resumes. 

Nga mihi mahana,

Mark Ashcroft

Principal 

Kia ora koutou - Dear Parents and Whanau,

I hope each and everyone of you are safe and well in your whanau bubbles. We have received very encouraging feedback from parents regarding the home learning plans and resources provided for our tamariki. I want to thank our amazing team of teachers, teacher aides and support staff for the thoughtful ways they have planned sessions for your children, communicated with parents and students and kept the school buildings and administration running smoothly.

As more businesses open and essential personnel continue with their work, not all families are able to keep students home. We acknowledge that learning from home can be great for whanau time as well as present a range of difficult challenges. Please talk to our teachers and support staff if you are finding things tricky and we will help where possible. During Alert Level 3, the school will be open to children who are not able to be supervised at home. Over the next couple of weeks we will have a small number of students in school. We also have a small number of staff on site to supervise the students. Student learning in school will be the same as the remote learning tasks for students learning from home.

Families of students who are attending school have been contacted separately with relevant attendance information. Any visitors to school are asked to be familiar with the Ministry’s ‘Lets keep everyone safe’ information. As Alert Level 3 is likely to continue for at least the next couple of weeks, we would still encourage families to follow the Ministry of Education’s advice for schools and ECEs that all children and young people who can stay at home, should stay at home. 

Under Alert Level 3 there will be no SKIDS before or after school care provision. The School Office will be closed, at least for the duration of Alert Level 3. Phone calls will be diverted to the office staff and emails will be answered.

Home learning links that might be of interests to parents and carers include the Ministry of Health backed Sparklers site. This is a fun wellbeing site with a range of activities. Additionally, the Ministry of Education’s Learning from Home site has plenty of ready to use resources for students and parents.

On behalf of all the School staff I do want to thank our students and their whanau bubbles for all the home learning efforts that are taking place. 

Nga mihi mahana,

Mark Ashcroft

Principal 

Kia ora koutou - Dear Parents and Whanau,

Following the COVID Alert Level changes and timelines announced by the Prime Minister on the 20th April, I am writing to inform you of what ‘Level 3’ will look like at Parua Bay School and to determine which children will be returning to school on Wednesday 29th April. 

The key message from the Ministry of Health is that we are still in a state of emergency and the best course of action for parents and carers is to keep their children at home and maintain distance learning wherever possible. Students and staff with underlying medical conditions should remain home.

For both students, whanau and staff, returning to school does raise a degree of transmission risk which we will seek to reduce through classroom bubbles, physical distancing, handwashing regimes and surface cleaning. Please do not send children to school who are sick, they will be sent home straight away - please also report any flu-like symptoms. 

Multiple bubbles of approximately 10 students each will be created. Physical segregation of bubbles plus staggered start, break, lunch and end of day times will be used to reduce interaction between student groups. Under Ministry of Education requirements, no playground equipment or PE equipment will be available to students during breaks as they constitute a transmission risk. Students will be asked to maintain a 2 metre safe distance from each other at break times and maintain a 1 metre distance in classrooms. Classroom furniture will be arranged to accommodate physical distancing as much as possible. Learning experiences of students that do attend school during Alert Level 3 will be on the whole a continuation of existing online or remote lessons and activities. 

We have received no indications that school buses will be operating. Due to staggered start and finish times, which we will notify you of as soon as possible, parents are advised to arrange their own transport to and from school independent of bus services. There will be no SKIDS after school service due to the risk of mixing bubbles.

Parents and carers are asked to communicate with the School Office via phone or email and avoid any unnecessary physical contact or meetings with staff. The Senior Leadership Team are planning for different attendance scenarios and bubbles. In order to do this we need you to complete the Google Form linked at the bottom of this letter by Thursday of this week at the latest. This will help us to make staffing decisions while also seeking to keep transmission risks to a minimum.

The teachers and support staff are keen to return to ‘normal’ schooling for your child when it is safe to do so. The change from Alert Level 4 to Level 3 suggests we still have to exercise a high degree of caution before the state of ‘normal’ schooling is reached.

I hope you are safe and well in your whanau bubbles and very much appreciate your completion of the linked form. 

Nga mihi, 

Mark Ashcroft

Principal 

Kia ora whanau,

We have received information from the Ministry of Education on this FREE online internet safety tool they have set up. We would encourage you to use it at home on your child's device.

Helping students stay safer online from home

As you know, children's online safety is important. At school, Network for Learning (N4L) helps keep students safe from the bad side of the internet. During lockdown, the students' place of learning shifts to their home. So N4L has worked out a way to help parents keep their children safely connected at home.
FREE N4L safety filter for all students
We've set up a safety filter that parents can set up on their child's learning devices from home. Just go to switchonsafety.co.nz to find clear instructions on how to do this.
The free N4L safety filter (by global cyber-security leader, Akamai) blocks websites containing known cyber threats like phishing scams, malicious content and viruses, while also protecting children from content deemed the worst of the web (like adult sites).
It is an extension of one of the many safety and security services we have in place at schools and is a valuable layer of protection to help keep children safe online. Please remember that technology is not a silver bullet and the filter should be used in combination with Netsafe's online parent safety toolkit.

How does it work?
Once a child's device is set up, all internet search requests will go through the safety filter which checks if the website they are trying to visit is safe before allowing access. If it's a website that's known to be unsafe, then it will be blocked. The safety filter is applied to the child's device, so parents' devices are not affected. 

Any questions. please get in touch

Ka kite

Hazel Smith

Deputy Principal

hazel.smith@paruabay.school.nz

"Kids will do well if they can"

......if they are not doing well, 

it's up to us as adults to figure 

out why.....so we can help them.