SCHOOL CLOSURE INFORMATION (w/c 8 June 2020)
The College remains closed due to Covid-19 and will only be open to those students with Key Worker status. Other specific groups of students will have been notified by the College if they are eligible to be in attendance.
The College will always follow advice from external agencies. Any change in procedures or opening arrangements will be communicated by email as soon as they are known.
The office email address: office@arthurmellows.org remains the best way to contact the College. We will endeavour to respond to individual enquiries as soon as possible.
KEY WORKER / VULNERABLE STUDENT ATTENDANCE
For those students where attendance at the College has been confirmed, arrangements for attendance is as follows:
- The school day will be as normal: 8.45 am to 3.05 pm. Students will be expected to arrive promptly on site between 8.45 am - 9.00 am for registration. Please drop them off in the Bus Playground from Monday 8 June 2020. Students will all be directed to their classrooms for registration.
- Students need to be in School Uniform and should have a pair of trainers with them for physical activity.
- Students should arrive at school with a bag and appropriate equipment as they would a typical school day – as a minimum: a pen, pencil, relevant books.
- Days are formal and timetabled to allow for the rota staff that day to deliver and support a range of subject lessons as well as support students doing their SharePoint work in other subjects. The usual opportunity to work independently on the Sharepoint work as well as some physical/outdoor activity will continue to be built in to their day.
- Students are expected to work and behave as they would in a typical school day and the more relaxed atmosphere that we had for smaller groups will change as our numbers increase.
- Students have their own ‘work station’ and desk in these classrooms to minimise the sharing of resources.
- Students break and lunchtimes are structured to ensure social distancing is adhered to.
- Year 10 students will be working on their Sharepoint work but also expected to ‘attend’ their Teams lessons and be supported to log in if needed.
- Any absences from normal regular attendance should be emailed to absence@arthurmellows.org by 9.00 am stating the following:
- Child’s Name
- Year Group
- Name of Caller
- Reason for Absence:
- Illness – Covid-19 related
- Illness – Non Covid-19 related
- Shielding for self or other family member
- Household isolation
- ID as to key worker classification could be requested by the College at any point during this phase.
Please Note: If students are considered to be in high risk groups, or are displaying symptoms, as per Government advice, please advise the College and remain at home.
Refreshments
For students on site, there will be a downscaled refreshment service via our catering provider. Students can also bring their own refreshments if they wish to. Free School Meal provision will continue.
Behaviour
The College’s Behaviour Policy will apply whilst students are on site. Parents / Carers will be contacted in the event of poor behaviour and will be asked to collect their child.
General
Thank you to everyone for adapting to the current developing situation that we find ourselves in. The College will continue to provide updates as often as possible to the situation and provide key information to assist with ‘remote learning’. We recognise that we will not always get everything right but are doing our best to support students during the school closure period.
STUDENTS WORKING REMOTELY
Our plan to support students with working from home is to set work via SharePoint and Microsoft Teams / Assignments. Students should be familiar with how to access these platforms; if in doubt please see the information leaflets on the ‘school closure’ section of the College website.
Years 10 and 12
Following the recent announcements on the phased re-opening of primary schools, we have received guidance on our options for ‘face to face’ support for Years 10 and 12.
The College has spent some time discussing how best to provide direct support that is of educational value. At this stage, with an improved confidence in remote learning, it is vital that we continue to use this as our main form of educating these key groups at this difficult time. To this end, the College will be publishing details of remote lessons to parents and students for the start of the week beginning 15 June 2020. This will be supplemented by the use of the Teams Assignment feature that will aid with feedback and support.
In addition to this academic content, there will also be a package of remote pastoral care involving Tutor Groups, both as a whole and the opportunity for virtual ‘drop-in’ of individuals to aid learning. At this stage we do not intend to offer this on site, as the resource that will be required to bring this safely to fruition, taking into account the health and wellbeing of students and staff, would take away from our ability to deliver quality remote lessons. We are also conscious of the threat of spreading the virus by close mixing and the difficulties encountered by students travelling to and from school, the vast majority of who use public transport.
All this planning is subject to revision, based upon the national guidelines but it is hoped that we can provide the best possible experience for the young people in Years 10 and 12 using the above approach. If the situation changes during the remainder of this Summer term, we will update you.
Years 7, 8 and 9
Provision is via SharePoint with weekly updates to work set being carried out by teachers. We are currently trialling online lessons with selected Year 9 students, however, we remain conscious of safeguarding issues and our capacity. As you will be aware, students in Years 7, 8 and 9 cannot email their teachers directly. If, however, they wish to contact someone about a particular issue, please support them with contacting office@arthurmellows.org and your enquiry will be redirected.
The College is actively working to support students at home as best as we can do, given this school closure period. We recognise the pressures that many households are under but rest assured we are doing all we can to support you given the limited resources available to the College.
STUDENTS WITHOUT INTERNET ACCESS
We are aware that some children may not have access to the internet at home. Therefore, please could you contact us via the office email to let us know if you DO NOT HAVE INTERNET ACCESS and we will try to arrange to have hard copies of work ready to collect from Main Reception fortnightly on Mondays between 10.00 am and 2.00 pm (subject to social distancing rules allowing us to do so).
Please note the College is unable to print work off and make it available for collection UNLESS students DO NOT have Internet access.
Please also see the ‘Home Learning Update’ at the bottom of this page for alternative ideas and general advice.
GCSE AND A LEVEL EXAMINATIONS
See link below for further guidance on examination results.
CHILD PROTECTION
Our Designated Safeguarding Leads are Jo Sludds, Nathan Steele and Chris Phillips. In the coming weeks, should you have any safeguarding concerns please email the College on office@arthurmellows.org using the subject “Safeguarding” and marking the message urgent. If you feel a child is at imminent risk, our advice is to also contact the most appropriate agency such as Children’s Social Care or the Police. If a child is presenting with a serious mental health problem please contact 111 or present to Accident and Emergency requesting the support of the mental health crisis team.
The following website also has useful advice regarding mental health support:
KEY WORKER DEFINITION:
This includes but is not limited to doctors, nurses, midwives, paramedics, social workers, care workers, and other frontline health and social care staff including volunteers; the support and specialist staff required to maintain the UK’s health and social care sector; those working as part of the health and social care supply chain, including producers and distributers of medicines and medical and personal protective equipment.
This includes nursery and teaching staff, social workers and those specialist education professionals who must remain active during the COVID-19 response to deliver this approach.
This includes those essential to the running of the justice system, religious staff, charities and workers delivering key frontline services, those responsible for the management of the deceased, and journalists and broadcasters who are providing public service broadcasting.
This only includes those administrative occupations essential to the effective delivery of the COVID-19 response or delivering essential public services such as the payment of benefits, including in government agencies and arms length bodies.
This includes those involved in food production, processing, distribution, sale and delivery as well as those essential to the provision of other key goods (for example hygienic and veterinary medicines).
This includes police and support staff, Ministry of Defence civilians, contractor and armed forces personnel (those critical to the delivery of key defence and national security outputs and essential to the response to the COVID-19 pandemic), fire and rescue service employees (including support staff), National Crime Agency staff, those maintaining border security, prison and probation staff and other national security roles, including those overseas.
This includes those who will keep the air, water, road and rail passenger and freight transport modes operating during the COVID-19 response, including those working on transport systems through which supply chains pass.
This includes staff needed for essential financial services provision (including but not limited to workers in banks, building societies and financial market infrastructure), the oil, gas, electricity and water sectors (including sewerage), information technology and data infrastructure sector and primary industry supplies to continue during the COVID-19 response, as well as key staff working in the civil nuclear, chemicals, telecommunications (including but not limited to network operations, field engineering, call centre staff, IT and data infrastructure, 999 and 111 critical services), postal services and delivery, payments providers and waste disposal sectors. |
Instructional Video: Accessing Group Emails on SharePoint
