Hello,
Following the confusion over whether schools are to return after the May half term and the conflicting advice from the government, The DFE, from the ISC, ISA and the unions, The Alternative School would like to advise you of what our plans look like from the 1st June until the 24th July, when we will break for Summer.
Firstly, we are making contingency plans to ensure that we have some of our team available throughout the summer to touch base with pupils and to offer some activity sessions, carefully easing pupils back into the school campuses. Safeguarding calls over the summer period will also continue and we hope that this light touch will help to keep our pupils and parents engaged, ready for a fresh start in September.
This also means that we are opening once again for NEW REFERRALs as of the 1st June 20, to enable those pupils who are referred to TAS, have the opportunity to start to get to know us, visit the school and work with our teachers so that they too can settle in before the fresh start in September.
In campus, we are still taking the safeguarding of both our staff and our pupils very seriously and we are risk assessing pupils who wish to return to school, from all year groups on a 1:1 basis. We are continuing to educate every pupil daily, remotely or in school and we are focussing a lot of our energy on ensuring the transition phase for year 6 and year 11 pupils is well supported and pupils are clear of their transition path.
For our year 10’s, we are encouraging back into school, should the risk assessment allow and are entering these pupils on The Duke of Edinburgh Award, which enables them to begin working towards this as of June 1st, and also over summer, offering them some focus before they fully return in September.
Home visits for safeguarding, free school meals, the delivery and collection of work, live lessons and flipped teaching is still continuing and we are trying our best to educate everyone and ease all pupils and staff back into the routine of school in a safe way.
Since the start of Covid, we have had a ‘TAS Covid Planning Team’ and have met (remotely) as a team every Monday morning to discuss the plans for each campus and all of our vulnerable and critical children. This continues to happen and we have allocated senior members of our team also making additional phone calls weekly to our most vulnerable families to ensure we are supporting them.
Our motto has been throughout this period, #educationinisolation
Our motto has also become, #educationcanbealternative
Our message remains that education will continue for all TAS pupils, some will return to campus, some will remain at home, some are enjoying live lessons and on-line learning, others prefer work to be delivered, collected and marked. The Alternative School has been up for this challenge since the start, and will continue to do so, helping to ensure that each child works towards achieving 100% of their personalised timetable.
We would like to thank you for your continued support.
Warm regards and stay safe.
TAS Team