Dear Parents and Carers
On Monday next week we conclude our onsite mass testing and move to home testing instead. Between Thursday 4 March and Monday 15 March we will have processed around 5,000 Covid tests; these are in addition to the staff and student testing that has been in place throughout lockdown and it is high time I thanked all those who set up our test centre and the volunteers who have been working there.
Right back in February 2020, we met and set up our Covid Rapid Action Plan (yes, I’m sorry to say that is what we called it; little did we know just how swamped everybody would be in Covid Rapid Action Planning throughout the subsequent year), and of all the challenges in that weighty tome, setting up mass testing has been one of the most interesting. The fact that it was ready for the start of the January term is testament to the work of our site team, IT technicians and members of the leadership team who worked on it over Christmas. But the real bonus has been that it is a really enjoyable place to work, and this is down to the volunteers who staff it every day.
We have only ever asked for people to volunteer for this duty as it did and still does carry elevated risk of infection, and the quickest by far to come forward were all our scientists. The opportunity to swap human interaction for dirty and possibly infected swabs is something scientists live for. Seriously though, I’d like to thank all the science teachers who have worked there, but particular thanks go to the science technicians who have been there pretty much every day.
Some of our teaching assistants, staff from student support and the librarians have worked in the centre throughout and most tests have been recorded on the NHS website by one member of our admin team who has been there every day (with support from a colleague in our sixth form team on Thursday 4 and Friday 5 of March, when we did almost 1,000 tests each day.
Our school counsellors, recently retired staff, governors, English as an additional language staff, support staff and the family members of staff have all spent a large amount of lockdown working on Covid tests and continue to do so. Our new Covid Manager has been on duty each day along with a handful of leadership team. I must thank Assistant Head Teacher, Mr Cannon, for solving the registration issues and making the system very quick. Where some schools have yet to get all their kids in, this is probably because they don’t have a Mr Cannon to streamline the arduous registration process.
On any given day, a good number of our test processors are mums who have volunteered to support the testing and without them there is absolutely no way we would have been open on Monday for all our kids. We are really grateful to all of our volunteer mums, some of whom have been here every day of lockdown (in fact they starting attending school every day from the point their children were sent into lockdown to home school – hmmmm…) for working so hard and being such good company.
All in all, it has been a strange thing for an educational establishment to do but as I said, we have quite enjoyed it (despite the echoes of snapping gloves, gagging and sneezing through the sports hall) and I have to say the kids have been great every time.
Well done everybody and please keep up the home tests.
Best wishes
Andy Perry – Head Teacher
