St Kilda Park Primary principal warns of social distancing problems at crowded schools
The head of St Kilda Park Primary School warns keeping young kids 1.5m apart “will not be possible to introduce and maintain” as students return from lockdown in a few weeks.
Inner South
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Victorian schools are scrambling to put safety measures in place ahead of students’ return to classrooms later this month but the state government’s restrictions have raised concerns for some inner south schools.
St Kilda Park Primary principal Neil Scott told the Leader social distancing would be “our biggest challenge” at the packed school.
“In reality, a 1.5m gap between children and staff members will not be possible to introduce and maintain,” he said.
The packed 378-student school on Fitzroy St is already “operating at capacity” and has a strict zone boundary in a bid to stem the tide of enrolments.
“We are pretty crowded as we are on a small school site but our location on the park with so much open space around us means that we can spread out physically at break times and for parent drop off and pick up — this isn’t a luxury that all our local schools have,” Mr Scott said.
Other schools in Port Phillip are likely to be similarly affected, with most at capacity.
Under the return-to-school plan announced by Premier Daniel Andrews today students will head back to school in a staggered approach with Preps, Grade 1 and 2 and Year 11 and 12 students returning on May 26.
Year 3 to 10 will return from June 9.
Mr Andrews said school drop offs and pick ups will be staggered, as will lunch breaks, to allow for social distancing and there will be no assemblies, sports, camps or excursions for Term 2.
Mr Scott said he had only been notified of the plan during this morning’s announcement.
“We are now going to use the two weeks that we have to plan for managing this transition in the safest possible way,” he said.
“The (Department of Education and Training) will be providing us with guidelines and documentation to support our planning in this area and we will engage with these and our neighbouring schools to share ideas and plot the best course of action.”
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Mr Scott said he believed it was compulsory for students in public schools to return on the advised dates for their year level, with no option to continue remote learning.
“In reality we know that many families will have anxieties about sending their children back to school and we will do our best to support them during this process,” he said.
“It will, however, not be possible for our teachers to provide high quality face-to-face teaching and learning and also continue to provide remote and flexible learning online.”
Mr Scott said the school had been holding remote video assemblies all term and the practice would continue “until social distancing rules have been relaxed to the extent that large gatherings are possible”.