Taupō school community gears up for start of the 2022 school year

Taupō-nui-a-Tia College acting principal Richard Murphy. Photo / Rachel Canning

The long hot summer holidays are over and kids are returning to school but uncertainty lurks with Omicron on the horizon.

According to the Ministry of Education's provisional school data, Taupō-nui-a-Tia College has the largest school roll this year with 1056 students, down from 1065 in 2021.

Acting principal Richard Murphy says the senior leadership team met with staff on Tuesday to present plans and backup plans for the year.

"This is not an A, B plan scenario. We've got plans A to Z for when teaching, administration, and grounds staff are away because they are sick or isolating," he says.

Late last week, the Ministry of Education released Covid-19 directives about mask-wearing, ventilation, keeping groups of students separate, and the process around a student testing positive.

Richard says when this happens, classmates will be classed as "close contacts" and will have to isolate for 10 days. Testing for the classmates is required on days one, five and eight and if there is a negative result in all three tests they can come out of isolation at the end of the 10 days.

The people in the classmate's household will be classed as "secondary contacts" and they will be required to isolate for at least five days. If the child (the classmate) tests negative after five days, then members of the household are released from isolation.

Classmates will be notified of another classmate's positive test through a templated letter from the ministry, using a range of communication channels that balance communicating with speed and being mindful of privacy.

High school staff are now required to wear surgical-grade masks, but there are no specifications around students' masks.

Richard says the biggest change for high school students may be that mask-wearing is compulsory when indoors.

"Wearing a mask will make a lot of students uncomfortable."

He says the college will be following the guidelines set down by the ministry, and masks will be considered part of the uniform. An exemption to wear a mask must be made to the deputy principal and will be approved if the student has a disability or health condition that prevents them from wearing a mask.

"We expect the wider school community to have an opinion at both ends of the spectrum. Some will feel we are not going far enough, others will feel we are being too stringent."

Masks are not required to be worn when students or staff are outside.

A main part of the school's strategy for dealing with anticipated teacher shortages is to change the timetable so that middle management can be brought in to teach.

"We also have a good supply of relievers. We are not anticipating asking parents to come into the classroom to help.

"If teachers are at home isolating but they are not sick, then they can teach the class through Zoom, and the school will provide class supervision."

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To lower the chance of airborne spread Omicron, the college is planning on keeping windows and doors open, and have ordered a carbon dioxide monitor to measure the success of natural ventilation.

Richard says the staff are looking forward to seeing the students again, and hopes students will embrace the full spectrum of school life in term one of 2022.

Central Plateau Principals Association chairwoman and Tauhara Primary principal Tracy Fraser says in the lead up to the start of the school year, it's really easy to be sucked into an environment of doom and gloom.

"We want kids to be excited about going to school and it's our job as principals to bring back the joy of teaching," she says.

Central Plateau Principals Association chairwoman and Tauhara Primary School principal Tracy Fraser. Photo / Supplied

Primary schools can arrange it so groups of children are kept separate within the school. When it comes to identifying close contacts, teachers have a good idea of who likes to play with who, particularly when the children have been attending the same school since the age of 5.

"Some primary schools have got 500 kids on quite small grounds, they are going to want to change the timetable so the kids aren't mixing all at once."

Principals attended a ministry presentation late last week, where the new directives were explained, and Tracy says the clear message that came through was "schools are not the mask police and you are there to support your students even if they don't have a mask".

Tracy says parents expressed a number of other concerns via social media; that schools would ask their child to produce a vaccine passport, and that the teachers would vaccinate the kids when they were at school.

"These things will not happen but they are legitimate worries and each school will know their own families and reach out to them to talk these issues through."

Strategies for dealing with many staff being away due to covid that principals in the Central Plateau are thinking of include splitting classes across the school, an intermittent halt in support programmes so those staff can be redeployed, and merging classes.