Kia ora koutou,

We hope you have all had a wonderful restorative break and managed to enjoy some of the gorgeous Autumn weather, we have been experiencing.

At the end of last term the Government announced that the country would move to the Orange Setting of the Covid Protection Framework. Please find information below outlining the guidelines we have put in place.

Thank you for your ongoing support while we plan and manage our response to Covid-19. We are really looking forward to seeing you all on Monday 2nd May.

Belinda and the Ilam School Team

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The key public health approaches under the Orange Setting of the Covid Protection Framework are included in the Ilam Update are:

• Face masks

• Ventilation

• Hygiene and Hand washing

• Sickness

• Second Hand Uniform Sale

At Ilam, we believe that masks have been one of the best tools available to us for limiting the spread of Covid-19 at school, and keeping our staff and our children as safe as we can. We are also aware that further waves of Covid-19 are expected, and that NZ is going into its first influenza winter in three years. We know that many families are also now travelling both within NZ and even outside NZ

For these reasons, we have decided to continue with our status quo on mask-wearing inside our buildings. This means we will continue to encourage our Year 4-6 learners to wear masks. Our staff will also wear surgical grade masks when inside.

We ask parents and whānau to wear a mask when coming indoors. You are welcome to enter buildings including classrooms but ask that you social distance and mask up.

We know that this cautious approach has served us well so far. We will continue to review this during Term 2, as we get a better picture of case numbers in our school community.

Ongoing advice from the Ministry of Education is that we will need to continue to have spaces well ventilated. As we head into winter we will need to keep windows and, at points in the day, doors open. So please make sure you think about getting some thermals for wearing under t-shirts and ensure your child comes to school with a school fleece. It will be important that children have layers of clothing to keep them warm.

We will continue to ask children to sanitise their hands before they eat at morning tea and lunchtime and we will provide hand sanitiser stations for them. When possible the children will sit outside to eat in their class groups.

Under the Covid Framework, Staff have been asked to observe children on arrival, checking for symptoms of illness. Staff will check for signs of cough/cold/fever/tummy ache/headache or a runny nose. The School will contact the parents/whāanau of children who appear unwell and arrange for parents or caregivers to come and collect them. We ask for and appreciate your support with this and understand that this can be disruptive, but it is important that our children and staff are not exposed to unwell children.

Staff have also been advised to stay at home and to get tested if they are unwell.

The PTA will be hosting a Second Hand Uniform Sale on Friday 6 May from 8.30am Our second hand uniform sale is a great way to get extra items for winter or a whole uniform should you need it. Items are of high quality and well priced. So make sure you check it out. Any profit made on sales is used to buy teaching resources across the school. We will be sharing a fundraising update in the coming term.

If you are able to help out on the day please contact our Admin team at admin@ilam.school.nz and someone from the PTA will be in touch with you. The PTA would appreciate your support with this event.