14 July 2020
Dear Parents and Carers,
As you would be aware, the Victorian Government has made some significant announcements in relation to arrangements for schools in Victoria for Term 2. If you live in Metropolitan Melbourne and Mitchell Shire you need to Stay at Home.
There are four reasons that you can leave home:
- Shopping for food or other essential items
- To provide care giving, for compassionate reasons or to seek medical treatment
- For exercise (outdoor exercise only, with only one other person or members of your household)
- Work or study, if you cannot work or study from home
Otherwise, you must stay home.
Based on advice from the Victorian Chief Health Officer, Victorian Government schools in metropolitan Melbourne and Mitchell Shire have extended school holidays for week 1 of Term 3. Schools will then move to remote and flexible learning for students in Prep to Year 10 from the start of Week 2.
The purpose of these arrangements is to reduce the number of students, parents and carers moving across metropolitan Melbourne and Mitchell Shire in order to reduce the spread of coronavirus (COVID-19).
To provide further assurance, our College, along with all other government schools and Early Learning Centres in metropolitan Melbourne and Mitchell Shire, will be conducting temperature checks of students who attend on site at the start of the day. If your child does have a temperature, you will be asked to take them home.
The Early Learning Centre remains open for those children who cannot be supervised at home.
The arrangements for Doveton College are:
Monday 13 – Friday 17 July are pupil free days for students Prep to Year 9. These pupil-free days will enable our staff to prepare for the change to remote and flexible learning which begins Monday 20 July.
We will provide an on-site supervision program for school students who need it during this week. This program is available for students where parents/carers cannot work from home and no other arrangements can be made, and for vulnerable students.
From Monday 20 July, Doveton College will be moving to remote and flexible learning.
The following students are eligible to attend school for on-site supervision. They will be undertaking the remote learning program under the supervision of teaching and support staff.
- Children of parents/carers who cannot make suitable arrangements to supervise children at home, including children of teachers in government schools who are required to return to work on-site
- Vulnerable children
- Children with disabilities
If you wish to access the on-site supervision program please contact the office who will organise for someone to call and discuss your eligibility and registration requirements.
REMOTE LEARNING EQUIPMENT AND MATERIALS
Over the holiday period we have serviced computers and reallocated to all students in the secondary sector and to those primary students who had one last time.
In addition to the laptops there are a range of different materials/equipment (including pens, pencils, art supplies) that all children will require during remote learning.
Packages for every child will be ready for pick up on the days and times below. Please go to the Agora, (via Laurel St Library entrance), sanitise your hands and maintain social distancing to collect your child’s package.
Years 7, 8, 9 Tuesday 14 and Wednesday 15 July 10:00am -2:30pm
Years 4,5,6 Wednesday 15 July 10:00am – 2:30pm
Years P,1,2,3 Thursday 16 July 10:00am – 2:30pm
Please make sure that you pick up these important materials and equipment to support your child’s learning during the remote learning period.
The Wellbeing team will be checking in with families on the phone this week. Next week teaching and support staff will begin regular phone calls to support your child’s learning. It is very important that we are able to communicate with all students, so please make sure that you answer our calls which may come from a private number when teachers are working from home.
We will follow similar arrangements to those we put in place for remote and flexible learning in Term 2. Based upon the feedback from the last remote learning period we have increased the number of live lessons for literacy and numeracy classes. All students will participate in a minimum 2 live literacy lessons and 2 live numeracy lessons each week. We anticipate a much smoother transition to remote learning as students are very familiar with the use of technology and we have reviewed and adjusted timetables to ensure a realistic and manageable workload for students working at home.
Please access the REMOTE LEARNING tab on the website which has been updated to provide you with information about how your children will access their learning now. Instructional videos have also been provided on the website to help you use Compass to email teachers and view lesson plans (COMPASS TRAINING tab). All learning platforms can be accessed from https://home.dovetoncollege.vic.edu.au/
The REMOTE LEARNING information provides you with contact emails for the relevant classroom teachers and a mobile phone number for the year level leaders. Please do not hesitate to contact your child’s teachers, or the College if you have any questions or concerns.
Please make sure you are able to access Compass using your log-in details. If you do not have login details please contact the College office asap on 8765 0111.
It is imperative that the College is informed of any change of details, can you please ensure your contact details ie. address, contact phone numbers and email are all up to date.
The latest information about coronavirus (COVID-19) and schools is on the Department of Education and Training website: https://www.education.vic.gov.au/about/department/Pages/coronavirus.aspx?
If you would like health information from the Department of Health and Human Services, you can visit https://www.dhhs.vic.gov.au/coronavirus
The Victorian Chief Health Officer has confirmed that the use of face masks or coverings by adults or children is not recommended in schools at this time. As has always been the case, students who wish to wear face masks at school and travelling to and from school may do so.
A reminder that if you, your child, or a family member develops symptoms of a fever, chills or sweats, cough, sore throat, shortness of breath, runny nose, loss of smell or taste, you should get tested at a coronavirus (COVID-19) testing facility and must stay home until you have received the result of your test. This is vitally important to continuing to keep our College community safe.
Thank you again, for working with us during the current challenges of the pandemic. We will need to continue to work closely together as we provide support to ensure the ongoing wellbeing and learning of your children, and in curbing the spread of the Coronavirus.
Please take care of yourselves and your families.
Yours faithfully
Debra Gibson