You will no doubt have picked up in the news over the last few days that there have been some significant announcements about the possible, partial re-opening of schools after half term. This has been accompanied by the publication of the first set of very detailed school-specific government guidance documents, which myself and the rest of the senior leadership team are now working our way through. We also expect the publication of further guidance documents more specifically relating to secondary schools soon, as well as further announcements and clarification from the government on what exactly is expected of secondary schools from June 1st.

What appears to be clear so far however, is that only Year 10 are being considered as the year groups who may be able to return for ‘some’ time in secondary schools during next half term. This will only be to supplement their continued online learning through to July however, and will not involve any kind of normal or full timetable being run, with the whole year group actually unlikely to be on site at the same time. For Years 7, 8 and 9 it now looks likely that they will not physically return to school at all until September and will therefore continue with online or home learning.

I must add at this early stage of policy announcement however, that nothing is set in stone and there is currently a considerable amount of communication occurring between local authorities, the teaching and associate staff unions and other education related professional associations with the Department for Education, in order to seek greater clarification on these announcements and the guidance published so far. 

Once we have had the opportunity to fully digest and make sense of the emerging details for secondary schools over the coming days therefore, I will be in touch again with further information for you. Whatever the final details do end up being, I would like to take the opportunity to remind you that our overriding priority at The Skipton Academy continues to be the wellbeing and safety of our students and staff, and we will work with you to ensure that this remains the case over the coming weeks and months, whilst we also continue to offer as high quality an online or home based education provision as we can in these very challenging times.

Thank you for your continuing support of The Skipton Academy and I hope you and your family are keeping well.

Richard McManus

Principal

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