Dear Parents/Carers,

Happy new half term everyone, I hope everyone is well.   One more week to go until we are all back together, how wonderful.  I hope you have all received and read the letter sent out on Tuesday explaining all the measures we will continue to take to keep Ash Grange as safe as possible.  We need your help with this too, everyone of us needs to do all we can to not spread this virus between one another. As you know we had one awful Covid outbreak in December, which largely affected Years 4, 5 and Funzone.  Public Health England’s analysis concluded that this started with a pupil which then spread through adult and child close contact.  We need to protect ourselves and one another, with clean hands, face protected and space from one another. 

In addition to this week’s letter we have some additional precautions:

1. Year 4 classes will not share staff and will be as follows: Year 4M will be Miss Mole, Mrs Cartledge and Mr Rattan. Year 4P will be Mrs Price, Mrs O’Doherty.
2. Mr Mayne will continue to teach the TWA programme to the separate Year 4 groups and Year 5 but will now undertake additional lateral flow tests in between.
3. Children will not share the changing rooms until after Easter (Step 2 of the national Roadmap), so on PE or TWA days children will come to school in PE kit:

   Day	PE kit worn to and from school, no other uniform required.
   Tuesday	Year 4M
   Thursday	Year 4P and Year 5
   Friday	Reception, Year 1, Year 2, Year 3, Year 6

4. Adults mixing between classes will only be when necessary and measures will be undertaken to prevent contamination and spreading of any virus.
5. Assemblies and lunch time in the hall will continue to be in key stages only as the hall allows for 1 meter + distance between classes only.
6. All the other preventative measures were detailed in Tuesday's letter.  
7. In preparation for the whole school return on 8th March, from Monday 1st March, the key worker/vulnerable children in school will be separated back into class mini bubbles with their teacher and learning assistant for the week so that there is a significant break between the groups changing from lockdown to whole classes.

Parent Teacher Meetings

In our plan for this school year, we were due to have Parent/Teacher meetings on 24th March but this is not the right time with a full return to school only 3 weeks before; therefore this day will be cancelled and the school open to all pupils as normal.  We will be undertaking assessments with the children this half term and setting targets for the summer term. We will schedule online meetings for the last week of the Summer 1 half term (w/c 24th May) with parents/carers, releasing teachers during the day and after school to discuss your child’s progress.  The end of year report will come out on 15th July as timetabled.

Baby News

Some wonderful news to share, Mrs Jones has had a baby boy, a whopper at 9lb 6oz and he is called Harry; here’s a pic:

Also, Miss Thomas (Year 2 Teacher) is having a baby in September which she is so excited to announce.  She will be with us for the rest of the school year.

Recruitment

We are in the midst of recruiting a number of posts and that will become live in the next week:

2 Cleaners – staff are moving areas

1 Learning Support Assistant for the new EHCPs that have been allocated for children

1 Chef as we take over the catering provision from our contractors, very exciting indeed.

1 Grounds Manager to develop the landscaping of the site and manage the upkeep (we are moving away from a contracted service with the local authority)

If you or anyone you know is interested in a post, then please see the application process through our website - www.ash-grange.surrey.sch.uk/vacancies/

A big thank you

Thank you to everyone who made creative pieces for the Nightingale hospital, here is a message to you from some of the NHS staff stars.

The scheduled SATS talks for parents of Year 2 and Year 6 on 22nd March have been cancelled as these assessments are not taking place this year.

Keep well and a continued thank you for all you are doing to support your child and the school.

Kindest regards,

Mrs Curtis

Attachments

Letter from Gavin Williamson to parents/carers

Details of school opening to the wider community on 8th March were sent on to all parent/carers by email on Tuesday. You can find a copy of the letter on our website at www.ash-grange.surrey.sch.uk/coronavirus-information/