Please click here for the transcript of the Prime Minister’s statement earlier this evening announcing school closures and that the summer examinations will not take place as planned.

 

For the remainder of this week we will be continuing with the partial closure of the school with Year 8s and 9s being asked to remain at home. We would like to stress that we are always able to supervise students in school if their family circumstances make that necessary, irrespective of whether they are in a year group that is not in school. This is particularly true for the children of key workers and children with special educational needs.
We will be continuing with our mock exams this week. We know students have been working hard for them and it is important that they are given the opportunity to demonstrate this.  We know there will be anxieties because the “real” exams in the summer are now not taking place as planned, and there is bound to be concern around the uncertainty of what will actually happen. But we can assure all our students that we are fully confident that neither GCSE nor A Level candidates will be disadvantaged by the current circumstances.
You will be aware of the Prime Minister’s announcement this evening that all schools in England will be closed at the end of the day on Friday and, with some exceptions, will remain closed to students until further notice. We are still awaiting clarification of what this means and will post updates on this website as soon as possible.
You may have noticed on our mobile website there is now another button, “Online Learning”, which is where we will be providing the links and resources to support students’ education for the immediate future.

 

The government has posted updated guidance for households with possible coronavirus infections. The core message remains, but it does clarify  “if you live with others and you are the first in the household to have symptoms of coronavirus, then you must stay at home for 7 days, but all other household members who remain well must stay at home and not leave the house for 14 days. The 14-day period starts from the day when the first person in the house became ill.” Click here for full guidance

 

We have had a number of calls from parents saying that their child feels better and will be able to return to school in a day or two.  Please be aware that this can not happen. 

Under the current guidance:

This means if your child, or any member of the household develops a persistent cough or has a high temperature then everyone in the household must isolate themselves for 14 days. It is more than likely that the cough or the temperature subsides before the two weeks are up, but that does not mean anyone should return to school (or work) before that time elapses.

So you are aware of our contingency plans, in the event of a partial closure it is likely that this will be restricted to students Year 9 or Year 8 or both year groups. We will endeavour to let parents\carers know the evening before, but will only be able to confirm on the morning of the partial closure. We will alert parents\carers of the students in the affected year group with a text message. Parents\carers of those in groups not affected by the closure will be updated through this web page. Should there be a need to be a partial closure of the school we will make arrangements so that students who are not able to stay at home can still be in school irrespective of whether their year group is involved in a partial closure.

• If you live alone and you have symptoms of coronavirus illness (COVID-19), however mild, stay at home for 7 days from when your symptoms started. (See ending isolation section for more information)
• if you live with others and you or one of them have symptoms of coronavirus, then all household members must stay at home and not leave the house for 14 days. The 14-day period starts from the day when the first person in the house became ill
• it is likely that people living within a household will infect each other or be infected already. Staying at home for 14 days will greatly reduce the overall amount of infection the household could pass on to others in the community
• for anyone in the household who starts displaying symptoms, they need to stay at home for 7 days from when the symptoms appeared, regardless of what day they are on in the original 14-day isolation period. (See ending isolation section for more information
• if you can, move any vulnerable individuals (such as the elderly and those with underlying health conditions) out of your home, to stay with friends or family for the duration of the home isolation period
• if you cannot move vulnerable people out of your home, stay away from them as much as possible

Cllr Zane Brabazon, Deputy Leader of Haringey Council, has today sent a letter to Gavin Williamson MP, Secretary of State for Education requesting more support for schools to combat coronavirus and support staff, students, schools and families in managing the current situation. You can read that letter here 

Today at 11:00am updated guidance for educational settings was produced by the government. You can read that here.

This is their guidance:

We are asking that parents\carers encourage their child to wash their hands regularly when they are in school – when they arrive, before they eat at break or lunch and when they have been to the toilet.  It would be helpful if students had a hand sanitiser but we very aware that these are now extremely difficult to find.  Washing with soap and water is better anyway!   We are also encouraging students to be more mindful than previously about maintaining an appropriate distance from their peers and “keeping their hands to themselves.”

We are in the process of assembling resources for home study for those students who do need to self-isolate but are otherwise healthy enough to work and study. We hope to have these in place early this week.

We anticipate updates from the government on the actions school should be taking during the course of today.  We do not anticipate any change in direction, but except there will be clarification of some aspects of the action plan.

 

You may have heard that a local secondary school, Fortismere, will be closed on Monday 16th March for a “deep clean” following a positive coronavirus result. Undoubtedly this will raise some levels of anxiety but it should not cause alarm. The numbers of positive test results in Haringey is still fairly low (9). You can keep track of the number of confirmed COVID-19 cases in Haringey and elsewhere by visiting Public Health England’s dashboard. Neverthless, our thoughts are with those at Fortismere for whom this will be a cause for concern as well as a significant disruption.

The government has stressed that schools should do what they can to stay open, but also emphasise that people should stay at home for seven days if they develop a high temperature or new continuous cough. Health Secretary Matt Hancock has announced today. This follows the news on 12th March when the government announced we are moving out of the contain phase and into delay in response to the coronavirus outbreak. This means they want people to stay at home and avoid all but essential contact with others for 7 days from the point of displaying mild symptoms, to slow the spread of infection.

The symptoms are:

You do not need to call NHS 111 to go into self-isolation. If your symptoms worsen during home isolation or are no better after 7 days contact NHS 111 online at 111.nhs.uk. If you have no internet access, you should call NHS 111. For a medical emergency dial 999.

The current plans remain that schools will remain open and students should continue to assume the summer exams will carry on as normal. However. we are mindful that we may suffer staff absences due to self-isolation so have a variety of contingency plans, which includes partial school closures, should the need arise. We will keep parents and carers fully informed.

 

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The UK Government and Public Health England announced yesterday that we have moved from “containing” the coronavirus to “delaying it.”  A key element of the new guidance is for those who have a high temperature or cough to self-isolate for seven days which they believe will have a very significant impact in the fight against coronavirus.  However, the core actions for all of us to wash our hands regularly, for about 20 seconds with soap and hot water or using a sanitiser gel and to make sure we use a tissue for coughs and sneezes and “Catch it, Bin  it, Kill it” remains the most important defence against the virus.  The main “dos and don’ts” are available on the NHS website here.

At Highgate Wood School we are doing all we in close and regular contact with Haringey’s Public Health Directorate and PHE to ensure that we are following their advice and putting measures in place to support the guidance being followed.  A lot of these actions are contained in the letter we distributed on the letter of 12th March .

With the new guidance please be aware that we are advising any student or member of staff who has a high temperature (above 37.9) or a new persistent cough, to self-isolate for seven days.  They do not need to phone 111, though they should do if they feel particularly unwell or have particular concerns about their symptoms.  The school will routinely authorise this absence (using a Y code) once we have been notified. If there are any concerns around this authorisation you will be informed.  Guidance for self-isolation can be found on the links on the right hand side of this page (at the bottom if you are on a mobile).

We are particularly mindful of those students who are preparing for public exams this summer. The current advice from the exams regulator Ofqual is that students should continue to prepare for their summer exams as normal. This is the approach that we must adopt at present.  At the same time, however, we know that there are lots of alternative plans and proposals that are being discussed and that the government, the exam boards and the exam regulators are modelling different scenarios to work out what would work best in different situations.   We know that students and parents across the country are worried about being the victim of something that is entirely outside of their control and schools are urging the government to provide clear guidance as soon as possible.  We will update our students and their families as soon as this happens.

For now we just need to remember is that every student in every school across the country is currently facing the same concerns, the same uncertainty and the same pressures.  The most important thing is to try and stop that stress impacting on your work and your preparations.  We are confident that, whatever may  happen, the government and the regulators will ensure that no individual or group is disadvantaged and that alternative arrangements, whatever they may be, will take into account the circumstances of those who are affected.