Year 11 pupils at St George's School, Blackpool sent home early as Covid hits staff levels

St George’s School at Marton took the measure affecting Year 11 pupils - aged 15 to 16 – because of a high number of staff absent with Covid.

Headteacher Graham Warnock wrote is a letter to parents: “All teachers have been and continue to cover staff absences, however we have reached a point when we can no longer cover lessons internally or recruit any external supply teachers to cover.

“As a result we have taken the decision to allow Year 11 to finish at 1pm unless they have an afternoon exam which is externally invigilated.

“We propose to run this model for the duration of the exams which is until Friday, February 11, however we will keep it under review.

“We chose year 11 as we feel they can also complete independent study at home during this intense exam week.”

Mr Warnock told The Gazette: “Year 11 have started an intense few days of mocks. This involves up to three exams a day. If there are no exams the afternoon slot is guided revision in the Academy.

“In consultation with our Trust, Cidari, we have taken the decision to allow year 11 to complete the afternoon revision sessions at home. This allows any staff who would have been supervising to cover other absences across the Academy.

"This will only be a small number of pupils for the duration of mocks, and for those not required to be in school to sit an exam.”.

Matt McIver, chief operating Officer of the Cidari Multi Academy Trust, of which St George's is part, said: "Throughout the pandemic our priority has been keeping our eleven Academies open and supporting them in the delivery of continuous high quality provision for our pupils.

"Contingency measures such as those being implemented at St George’s allow our Headteachers to respond to the impact of Covid and take proportionate action to protect the health and wellbeing of our pupils, families, staff and communities, whilst continuing to deliver the provision of excellent education to our pupils."

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