Useful information
Mask update
The Ministry of Health modelling in July shows that numbers of severe respiratory illness cases, including both COVID-19 and flu, are well down. Our combined efforts around mask wearing and careful monitoring for signs of sickness will have certainly contributed to this outcome - thanks to you all for playing your part in this.
Mask wearing when indoors continues to play an important role in minimising transmission of COVID-19 and winter illnesses, coupled with all your other layers of protection. We will continue to strongly encourage all year 4-6 ākonga and all staff to wear a mask when indoors for the rest of this term. Mask wearing is not required outdoors. We have a good supply of child and adult masks, and we will continue to make these readily available each day. We will also ask that parents and visitors also wear a mask indoors, and masks will be available at reception and in all hubs.
Covid cases update
We currently have no active cases that we are aware of amongst ākonga or staff, which is fabulous. We believe that good ventilation in our learning spaces, along with good mask wearing amongst staff and year 4-6 ākonga, have played a key part in this. We are keen to continue this trend of low or no case numbers, and so we will keep up our current precautions.
We will continue to keep some windows and doors open in learning spaces, to ensure good levels of ventilation. We are very lucky that our open learning spaces assist greatly with this. We keep our underfloor heating on throughout the day to ensure our spaces do not become too cold. We have several portable CO2 monitors around school, and several students are very vigilant around ensuring our spaces are well ventilated, opening windows and doors if levels become too high. This, coupled with a high level of mask wearing, will help to keep our illness levels low.
If your child tests positive for Covid-19, or becomes a household contact, please let the school office know, so that we can track current cases in the community and quickly identify any possible spread at school.
Returning to school after illness
The Ministry of Health has confirmed their guidelines around returning to school following illness.
- After testing positive for Covid-19, tamariki can return to school on their 8th day after the onset of symptoms or after a positive Covid test, whichever happened first.
- If a child has been unwell with a respiratory illness other than COVID-19, they can return to school 24 hours after they have significantly improved and are behaving/eating normally.
- Following vomiting or diarrhoea, a child should be symptom free for 48 hours before they can return.
Kia haumaru te noho - stay safe and well.
Ngā mihi,
Urs Cunningham
