4 February 2022
Dear Parent and Carers,
We are ready and looking forward to all of our students, in every year level, returning to the school site on Monday 7 February!!!!!!!
Yes, some of our arrangements might look a little bit different to what we would usually do at the start of the term. For example, we won't be having all 1,500 students assembling on our basketball courts. We won't be able to have a staggered start, or run some of the usual transition activities due to COVID restrictions. Nevertheless, getting our students back to school is something we have all been focused on during the extra student free days.
Our swimming carnival has been cancelled, and our Student Leadership Investiture will now be held on Monday 14 March 2022.
We will be able to gather our Year 7s at the Assembly Hall, but parents will have to say goodbye at the school gate. Years 8 to 12 students will be able to enter the grounds and we will have set up, outside, year level gazebos, with staff and class lists available. The expectation is that Years 8 to 12 students will have accessed their timetable straight from OneSchool. Years 8 to 12 students will go straight to home group and then curriculum learning will kick off straight away.
We will be able to weave some of our start up activities into our school program throughout the term, so the kids will still get to do some of the usual first week back activities during the first few weeks. We have compressed the 10-week term into an 8-week program, so our students will need to be really organised and switched onto learning right from the start. Laptops will need to be charged and ready to go! Students must wear the formal uniform on Monday.
A number of our staff have been sick, COVID positive, close contacts, isolating or looking after sick family members during the last two weeks. The remaining staff have been at school planning curriculum. Some of our staff are not able to return to work as they have not been double vaxxed or are still recovering. Each day we have not been able to easily able to predict who will be at work. This is likely to continue during Term 1 and we are expecting a shortage of substitute teachers and to have to be creative to staff our timetable.
In saying this, everyone who is well, will be at work on Monday 7 February. All students who are well and symptom free on Monday, are very welcome to return to school. Any staff member or student who is unwell or showing symptoms will have to be removed and sent home with a RAT (Rapid Antigen Test). No, we won't be forcing testing on anyone on-site or anyone who doesn't want to be tested, however students or staff with symptoms simply can't be at school and will have to go home. We will notify parents in some manner about positive cases at the school and monitoring the situation carefully. Everyone will need to follow the mask mandate; those with medical exemptions for wearing masks can collect an exemption card from the student counter in the administration block.
Thank you for your ongoing support and well wishes, as we work together to respond to the evolving COVID-19 situation.
Some information from the Education Department that I have been asked to share:
As announced by the Premier on Sunday 30 January 2022, the Queensland Government has released the COVID-safe back to school plan.
From Monday 7 February, key features of the plan include:
· The suspension of school camps, excursions, assemblies, and large gatherings (please note that school sport will continue as usual)
· Limiting visitors on site, with exceptions for parents and carers of students experiencing vulnerability
· Buses will run as usual
· Mask wearing for all high school students and all staff, exemption cards available from admin
· Sanitiser will be available and soap dispensers refreshed during the day
· With the opening of the new Sports Performance Centre toilets, we will now decommission the old K, F and B Block toilets so students will have access to lovely new toilet facilities
· Rapid Antigen Tests (RATs) will be available from the school for students and staff who develop symptoms while on site - priority access to RATs for students and staff at Queensland Health testing clinics
· A range of ventilation measures will be in place
You can access the Back to School plan here, and further information and FAQs on the Department of Education COVID-19 website.
Essential to the success of these measures, is that if your child is unwell or displaying any COVID-19 symptoms they must not attend school. I cannot emphasise this message strongly enough – it is critical to keeping our school community safe.
Yours sincerely,
Fiona Free
Executive Principal
Caboolture State High School
Information to help you get back to school.
2022 Back to School T1.pdf