Dear Parents and Carers

In preparation for the forthcoming holidays, I just wanted to take this opportunity to remind you that College will finish slightly earlier on Friday 18th December.

Year 11 will leave first at 12:55

Year 10 at 1:05

Year 9 at 1:10

Year 8 at 1:15

Year 7 at 1:20pm

Post-16 students will then leave at 1:25pm. Food will be available at first break.

Please remember College re-starts on TUESDAY 5th JANUARY 2021 and next half term will end on THURSDAY 11th FEBRUARY 2021

Each year students have to complete 190 days in school. In September you may remember we started earlier than most schools on the 3rd and 4th September and so this has allowed us to start next term on the TUESDAY 5th JANUARY and finish next half term on THURSDAY 11th FEBRUARY 2021.

Reporting Covid during the holidays

If your child tests positive between the 19th and 24th December

During the holiday period we will voluntarily continue to support our community to stay safe by offering a track and trace service up to, and including, Christmas Eve, 24th December. If your child shows symptoms and/or tests positive during this time, please report this to positivecovidcase@exmouthcollege.devon.sch.uk. We will regularly monitor this email.

If your child does start showing symptoms over the first weekend of the holidays, please get them tested as soon as possible. We will contact trace students who have been in College for their infectious period, which is either 48 hours prior to symptoms becoming apparent or 48 hours before a positive test result so getting a test result quickly is really important if your child has any worrying symptoms, including a headache and sickness which have sometimes been identified as symptoms, particularly in children.

We will then notify, by text/email, any identified student contacts who have been within 2m in a classroom or been part of a friendship group where they have been a close contact. In these circumstances the identified student will need to isolate for 14 days since the contact with the positive case.

We only need to do this for students or staff who were in school for the 48-hour infectious period prior to showing symptoms or testing positive if asymptomatic.

If your child tests positive from 25th December 2020 to 4th January 2021

You must follow PHE guidance and isolate.

If the isolation period extends into the new term, then you will need to let the college know by emailing us at admin@exmouthcollege.devon.sch.uk by 08:00hrs, Tuesday, 5th January 2021. We will then contact you for further information in case we need to notify other parents/carers of students deemed to have been in ‘close contact’ with your child during the latter part of the holiday, as they will also need to isolate.

If your child tests positive, then it would be really useful if you could forward a copy of the confirmation email (or a screenshot of the text) to positivecovidcase@exmouthcollege.devon.sch.uk for our records.

Many thanks for your continued support.

Andrew Davis​

Principal

Exmouth Community College