16th September 2021
Updated 30 September: The guidance has been further updated. Parents/carers may accompany children onto school premises where this is agreed with the school and is considered necessary to support children and young people. Where it is considered beneficial, parents/carers may also attend school premises for individual parental visits related to the wellbeing, progress and behaviour of children.
It also allows parents/carers to attend school premises to spectate at outdoor school sports events, and for Parent Council and PTA meetings to take place on school premises where it is considered necessary for these to function. If virtual arangements are already in place and working well, these should continue. You can find the updated section here.
On 15 September, the Scottish Government announced that COVID-19 mitigations in schools will continue until at least the October break. Connect had written to the COVID-19 Education Recovery Group to express concern that communications to parents/carers about COVID-19 cases and reporting them in schools was not clear. We are really pleased that the new Scottish Government guidance now provides clarification.
The guidance says face coverings in secondary schools, avoiding large scale gatherings such as assemblies, physical distancing and other mitigations will continue. Key changes to the guidance include:
Vaccinations: All young people aged 12 and over will be offered the coronavirus vaccination in Scotland, subject to parent/carer consent if appropriate. Following currently scheduled community vaccination sessions, it is expected that there will be a programme of vaccination in schools to ensure that any young people who have not been vaccinated, and who decide that they wish to be on the basis of informed consent, have the opportunity.
Reporting positive cases to schools: Schools should ask parents whether their child has tested positive for COVID-19 when parents are reporting absences, and parents should be prompted to mention any positive tests when leaving messages about absences. Contact tracers will also remind parents to inform the school when there is a positive test. In certain circumstances Test and Protect will inform the school of positive cases.
Reporting positive cases to parents: As soon as schools are informed of a positive case they should take action to identify low risk contacts so they can issue them with a targeted information letter the same day that sets out the actions those low risk contacts should take. Test and Protect will inform high risk contacts. Schools do not need to issue multiple letters to the same parents/staff if there are multiple cases in the same class during an outbreak, however, they should keep parents, pupils and staff informed regularly of key developments.
You can read the updated guidance here.