Covid-19 Updates and Information

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update friday 28 January 2022 - Return to school 2022

Kia ora koutou e te whānau

Whether you are new to our school community or you are returning after such a wonderful summer with whānau, we welcome you. This is a lengthy email and I ask that you carefully read it.

Our team at Kōwhai is feeling refreshed and ready to go for the 2022 year and we are excited to welcome everyone back onsite.

In regard to COVID-19 we have moved fully into the new traffic light framework for all our school and kura activities and events this year. While this is a challenge we know there are significant benefits for your children/tamariki to be at school - from an educational, social and developmental perspective.

As a Senior Leadership Team we have carefully planned “how” our school will operate, carefully putting in place mitigation features that will be key in keeping our school functioning. We have reviewed and are continuing to review all our events and activities for the upcoming term to ensure we meet the health guidance for Red. This has resulted in some changes that you need to know.

First Day of School

It is with a great deal of regret that we have had to make the decision that we will not proceed with our Powhiri on Tuesday 8 February.

In order to minimise the number of students/ākonga arriving at the same time, we have put in place a staggered start time.

Regrettably, parents/whānau are asked to remain outside the school grounds. There will be a number of staff at the gates to support and welcome students/ākonga.

Year 8 students:

Students arrive between 8:30am and 9am (no students outside this time please)
Students proceed directly to their class. 2022 classes can be viewed on Kindo
Year 8 students new to the school should make their way to the reception area where they will be escorted to their class by a member of the leadership team.

Year 7 students

Students arrive between 9:30am and 10am (no students outside this time please)
Students proceed to the fields
Students look out for their new teacher on either the top or bottom field. Teachers will be holding up their class sign. You can find out the class your child is in, by signing into Kindo - our school payment system. If you have any trouble accessing this information, please give our office a call and we will gladly help you. Please note that changes to class placements cannot be made at this late stage.
At 10am, the teacher will escort their students to the classroom
If it’s raining on the day, we will have staff on hand to take students straight to their classrooms.

Remainder of Term One

In order to minimise the contact between cohorts and avoid congestion on public transport, we have adjusted the school timetable.

From Wednesday 9 February, the school day for year 7 students will commence at 8:30am and finish at 2pm. Upon arrival, students must go straight to their classroom. Year 7 students must not enter the grounds before 8am.

From Wednesday 9 February the school day for year 8 students will commence at 9:30am and finish at 3pm. Upon arrival, students must go straight to their classroom. Year 8 students must not enter the grounds before 9am.

This organisation will remain in place for the duration of the term so that students and whānau have certainty and routine for the whole term.

Uniform Under RED (Covid Framework)

Last year under Level 3 restrictions, our students wore their PE gear to school each day which eliminated congestion in changing rooms. This worked well and as such, we have decided, given the current environment, that our students should wear their PE gear each day while we are in RED We acknowledge that some of you have already purchased the full uniform and we appreciate your preparedness. The full uniform will be worn as soon as restrictions are lifted. I acknowledge this is late notice, however, none of us expected we would commence 2022 at COVID Red!

At Kōwhai, we have the following health measures in place:

Ventilation

Providing good old fashioned fresh air remains the most important thing we can do in our learning spaces to minimise risk for learners/ākonga and teachers/kaiako. All doors and windows will be open in classrooms and airflow is supported by the use of fans. We have been informed that we will also be receiving a CO2 monitor in the coming weeks to further support our ventilation plan. Daily opportunities for outside learning have also been timetabled.

Face coverings

Staff/kaimahi and children/tamariki at Kōwhai must wear face coverings when indoors at school. Please ensure that if your child/tamariki has a face mask exemption, that you contact me before school starts. We respectfully request that the exemption is visible to staff so that there is no confusion. Staff are mandated to wear either a surgical mask or KN95/N95 mask whilst indoors.

Sanitising and Cleaning

Sanitising stations are set up in the entrance to every room. All students and staff are required to sanitise when they enter and exit a room. All people are also expected to wash and dry their hands after blowing their nose, coughing or sneezing, after handling their face covering, before and after eating or preparing food, after using the toilet, after handling rubbish, after touching animals and pets and when hands are visibly dirty or feel dirty. Protocols are in place to ensure regular surface cleaning during the day.

Physical Distancing

Students will be continually reminded of the need to maintain the physical distancing. The recommendation from the Ministry of Health is 2 metres outside and 1 metre inside, where practicable. Furniture in classrooms has been moved to maximise spaces and distance. Our plan has a clear focus upon minimising the contacts between Y7 and Y8 cohorts and classes across the school.

Vaccination

Ministry of Health advice is that Vaccination, including a booster shot, remains an important tool to help prevent the most serious harm from the COVID-19 virus. If children and young adults who have been vaccinated do develop COVID-19, they are far less likely to get seriously ill and less likely to transmit the virus to others.

The school is open for all students regardless of their vaccination status.

Managing cases in our school

We have a good contact tracing system in place so that if there is a confirmed case who has been at school while infectious, we can quickly identify who are the close contacts of that person. We will then quickly advise those contacts of what they need to do.

Only if the Ministry of Health or the Ministry of Education advises us to do so, would we consider closing the school and moving to distance learning for everyone. At Red we will keep everyone learning onsite for as long as we can.

It is essential that you make sure your contact details we have on file are up to date, so we can get in touch with you if needed.

Importantly, if your child/tamariki has cold or flu symptoms, please keep them at home. Call your Doctor or Healthline on 08003585453.

The following link is to the Covid Protection Framework (CPF) which identifies key things that schools and kura need to know. It may be helpful and informative to you.

You can expect a good number of emails from me over the next wee while and the school/kura will keep you updated regularly. Please do not hesitate to contact either myself or our APs, Barbara Cloonan (ap@kowhai.school.nz) or Jenny Howsam (jennyhowsam@kowhai.school.nz) if you have any queries, concerns or compliments. We do so much appreciate the latter.

Finally, while this might all feel a little overwhelming at times, we know that all of the measures we have in place will help your children return to school, reconnect with whānau and friends and do what they enjoy most, that is learning together.

See you soon!

He waka eke noa (We are in this together)

Nāku, nā

Louise Broad

Update 12 November 2021 - Return to school - Year 8 Children Wednesday 17th November and Year 7 children Thursday 18th November

Kia ora koutou e te whanau

This email sets out our return to school plans from 17 November to 14 December 2021.

In putting this plan together we are guided by the need to reduce transmission of the virus between staff and students and students within the school.

The school day will run from 9.30am to 2.30pm.
Children are to attend school in PE Uniform.

Year 8 Students will attend on site on Mondays Tuesdays and Wednesdays and will switch to learning from home on Thursdays and Fridays.

Year 7 students will attend on site on Thursdays and Fridays and will switch to learning from home on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays.

Te Whanau Pounamu is a composite Y7/Y8 class and they will all attend on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays and will switch to learning from home on Thursdays and Fridays.

Gafoa le Ata is a composite Y7/Y8 class and they will all attend on Thursdays and Fridays and will switch to learning from home on Mondays, Tuesdays and Wednesdays

Year 8 students will be welcomed back on site on Wednesday 17th November and year 7 students on Thursday 18th November.

Our advice from the Ministry of Education, is to focus on using face-to-face time at school:

for teachers to reconnect with learners
for learners to reconnect with each other
to check-in on the wellbeing of learners
for interactive discussions and collaborative, hands-on activities that support the remote learning programme
to provide one-on-one or small group time for vulnerable students
to engage safely in activities that may not have been possible during lockdown such as sports and the arts.

To enable us to undertake the above points we are applying the following mitigation strategies

The mandatory wearing of face masks inside classrooms for students and staff. You will need to provide your child with a mask.
We have created staff bubbles and class bubbles
We will be ensuring and practicing good hygiene across the school day
We will maintain stringent deep cleaning of toilets on a daily basis
We will maintain regular surface cleaning in classrooms during the school day and after school
We have minimised contact between year levels
We will be keeping accurate and accessible records on a daily basis outlining movements within the school
We ask that your children/tamaiti stay home when unwell
All staff on site have met the mandatory requirements for vaccinations
Staff must return a negative COVID test before returning on site to school
We have high vaccination rates for those eligible students 12 and over, (79% either single or double vaccinated at the time of writing this email)
We will be adhering to strict ventilation measures across classroom spaces by bringing as much outdoor air inside as possible.
We will be taking activities outside when possible so make sure your child/tamaiti has their hat each day

If there is a positive case at Kōwhai

When there is a confirmed case in the community, public health officials will undertake a case investigation and work closely with the confirmed case to identify any close contacts, including any connection to the school

Health officials will then contact either our regional Director of Education or the school directly to provide direction on contact tracing and other relevant information.

The Ministry of Education will support, with communications to the school community, based on this public health advice.

As a result of the case investigation, public health may be able to provide the following information:

infectious period or information that the person was not infectious when at school
any known activities onsite during that infectious period
isolation end date and testing advice for contacts.

In addition to the case investigation by Health, you will be able to identify those in your school or early learning service who may also be considered contacts, through our:

timetable (which staff were onsite with which classes, groups, bubbles)
attendance register
visitor register

The Ministry of Education will support the school to work our way through this process based on public health advice.

What often happens is a staff member, parent or caregiver/kaitiaki will first notify the principal that they or their child are a confirmed case.

In those instances, we will contact our regional Director of Education, who will provide advice on some next steps. Their team will connect with public health services to seek advice on next steps for our school.

Closing our school may not be required and should only occur in consultation with direction from Health or in discussion with the Director of Education.

Case investigation can take some time to ensure the risk assessment undertaken by public health is based on good information.

If the case investigation is therefore still underway, as an interim measure to mitigate risk and if advised by the Director of Education to do so, the following actions can be taken:

the confirmed case and their household should already be self-isolating
as a precaution, those who have been in the same classroom/bubble/room as the confirmed case for the previous 48 hours can be asked to stay away, until public health advice has been received
there is no testing requirement at this time for those individuals unless they are feeling unwell and are advised by Healthline or their GP to get tested
you will, however, be provided with specific guidance based on the public health risk assessment as soon as possible. This is likely to require any close contacts to self-isolate and get tested
undertake a clean prior to the other students, children and staff returning on site.

We will follow all Ministry of Health requirements so that we have layers of protection to reduce transmission within the school.

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any queries.

Nāku, nā

Louise Broad
Principal

update 27 October 2021 - Possible return to school 15 November - Principal’s message

Kia ora koutou,

I am writing to you following the Government’s announcement that plans are underway to support the return to onsite learning for our schools who are in Alert Level 3 areas and to do this in a way that is as safe as possible.

The restrictions of Alert Level 3 and 4 have been a real challenge to the wellbeing of our tamariki and whānau and we have heard from many of you that your tamariki are keen to see their friends and teachers.We are eager to see your children.

You can be reassured that any decisions about bringing more children and staff on-site will be done in accordance with strict public health guidance that we have been told we will receive– outlining how on-site learning will look like compared to Alert Level 2 or Alert Level 1 settings. For example, this might mean attending school two days a week and learning from home for the other three.However at this stage we have scant details from the Ministry of Education

The earliest a return to school will happen is 15 November, and we will provide more information about this once we receive it.

In the meantime, vaccination and testing remains the best thing we can do to keep whānau and our community as safe as possible. COVID-19 is finding those who are unvaccinated in this outbreak.

For this current outbreak (as at 25 October), 224 people have been hospitalised with only 6 (<3%) of these people fully vaccinated. Of the 2,681 cases in the outbreak, 1,984 (74%) had not received one dose of the vaccine (541 were not eligible for vaccination as they were under 12).

We need to look after our most vulnerable people, and it is great to see our community vaccination rates continue to go up. There are also now three million New Zealanders fully vaccinated – which is fantastic news!

Please do encourage your friends and whānau who might be worried about the vaccine to seek good information from health practitioners, so they can make a well-informed decision.

Ngā mihi

Louise Broad

Principal

update 22 september 2021- food and essential support for families

Kia ora koutou

If you are having trouble during this lockdown with accessing food and/or other essentials, Please take a look at this fact sheet as it has information and contact details that may be useful.

It covers:

food delivery
what people can do if they can’t get food delivered
staying safe when getting food delivered
financial help to buy food
food banks.

Please note, some food banks have been experiencing high demand. If there is a need for financial help to buy food, Work and Income may be able to help.

Barbara Cloonan
Acting Principal Kōwhai Intermediate School

Update 20 SEptember 2021 - move to level 3, Tuesday 21 Sept 11:59pm. Important Information required from parents and caregivers

Kia ora koutou,

We have now had advice from the Government that Auckland will move to Level 3 on Tuesday at 11:59pm. At Level 3, the only students who are permitted to attend school are those children of essential workers. Please complete this form so we know if your child will be staying at home or if we need to cater for them at school.

Advice of Level 3 attendance

Please complete this form as soon as possible; preferably before midday Tuesday 21 September so that we have time to arrange appropriate staffing.

Nāku noā, nā

Barbara Cloonan | Acting Principal
Kōwhai Intermediate School

update 17 september 2021 - SECRETARY of education update - school holidays

17 September 2021

Kia ora koutou

Today the Education Minister announced that school holiday dates will remain unchanged, starting from Saturday 2 October.

The Minister has carefully considered advice on how moving term dates presented challenges that would have had a wider and long-term impact by disrupting curriculum and activity plans already in place for students, whānau and educators.

Keeping the holidays as they are will avoid adding stress and anxiety to children and their education and wellbeing.

The Minister was also aware that an extended length of Term 4 for Auckland would add to fatigue among your students and staff at the end of a school year.

Ngā mihi maioha
Iona

Update 14 september 2021 - continued level 4 decision

On Monday 13 Sept the Prime Minister announced a continuation of current alert levels for the next week, but in principle, Auckland will move to Alert Level 3 at 11:59pm on Tuesday 21 September. We await that decision with anticipation! Thank you to our whole community for following the regulations for level 4 - we are in this together. Our team of 600 Whanau are supporting the team of 5 million!

In the meantime, Kia haumaru te noho (be safe/be well) and please reach out if there is anything we can do to support you.

Kia kaha,

Barbara Cloonan

Acting Principal

Update 24th August 2021 - Learning from Home Resources From MoE - Message from Acting Principal Barbara Cloonan

Kia ora koutou,

I hope you are all doing ok in your bubbles, and that children are engaging with learning from home programmes.

Just a reminder here that there are resources available to everyone beyond those we have at school, should you wish to tap into them. The following is a reminder from the MoE:

Available resources
The Learning from Home website has print-friendly, online resources that kura and schools can use to create tailored learning packs for their ākonga. Parents and whānau have access to these resources online as well.

These resources are available at the Supporting learning from home resources page on Learning from Home.

Curriculum teaching and learning resources (with guidance for parents) can be found online here for English-medium and here for Māori-medium.
Home Learning TV can be accessed On Demand here or via the TVNZ App on a device (mobile phone, smart TV or tablet).
Mauri Reo, Mauri Ora can be accessed on demand from Māori TV for primary-aged tamariki and here for secondary school rangatahi.

Barbara Cloonan

Acting Principal

Kōwhai Intermediate School

Update 23rd August 2021 - Level 4 continuing until Tuesday 31st August for Auckland - Message from acting principal Barbara Cloonan

Tēnā koutou e te Whānau o Kōwhai

As expected, our Level 4 lockdown has been extended. Naturally, we will continue to deliver our quality "learning from home" programme to your tamariki.

Please continue to keep an eye on the locations of interest which are posted on the Ministry of health website. And follow Healthline advice.

Above all, take care, look after yourselves and your loved ones and keep our community safe.

Kia haumari te noho (be well/be safe)

Barbara Cloonan
Acting Principal

Update 21st August 2021 - message from acting principal Barbara Cloonan

August 21 2021

Tēnā koutou e te Whānau o Kōwhai

Whilst we have been advised that NZ will be in Lockdown level 4 until Tuesday evening, all evidence suggests that this will be extended. We are well prepared to continue a quality "learning from home" programme to your tamariki. Please let your child's class teacher know if you are experiencing any connection problems. All students should be attending a daily Zoom session with their teacher so please make sure that your child is doing this.

Keep an eye on the locations of interest which are posted on the Ministry of health website. If you have been at any of these locations of interest during the relevant time, please follow Healthline guidelines: get a test immediately, self-isolate and call Healthline on 0800 358 5453. Please follow their advice to limit the spread of COVID-19.

Kia haumari te noho (be well/be safe)

Barbara Cloonan
Acting PrincipalKōwhai Intermediate School

Update 18th August 2021 - Message from Acting Principal Barbara Cloonan - emailed to all parents.

Kia ora koutou,

As per the announcement this evening from the Prime Minister, Kōwhai Intermediate will be closed for face to face instruction while we are in Lockdown Level 4.

This means that no students can attend school.

Our teachers will make contact with their students tomorrow, to support them with an online learning environment for the duration of the lockdown.

This will mean that students can expect a daily Zoom meeting with their class where their teacher will give them instruction about the learning for that day. Fortunately, all students were reminded to take their devices home today so there should be no child unable to connect with their teacher. However, if you have any concerns, please contact your child's teacher directly so that they can help.

Kia haumaru te noho (be well/be safe)

Barbara Cloonan
Acting Principal

Official Information Websites

As the situation is developing rapidly we refer the community to the official government sources for information:

Calendar

ALL events listed on the calendar are suspended until further notice.

We will post updates here and on the calendar once we have further advice from the Ministry of Health and Education.