Safeguarding Update:
For the rest of this half term, I will be trialling NOT opening one of our gates on the playground at home-time.
Why am I doing this?
- Our smaller side-gate leads directly onto the road and poses a potential risk for families exiting onto a main road that is still a national speed limit.
- The gate is quite inconspicuous, and drivers cannot see people exiting right up until the point of being by the gate, due to the angle of the fence.
- Families tend to park right across the exit/entrance of the gate (no fault attached, as there are no zig zags) and this means families are literally walking into the road to get by. Naturally, cars slow down when we have pick-up and drop-offs, but statistics of 20mph are still worrying.
- Although we have had no incidents (but likely anecdotal near-misses) I should not wait for something to happen! Risk assessment = hope for the best but plan for the worst. This move is trying to help protect you all.
- We can then safeguard our pupils even better by only having one gate to monitor.
The inconvenience will be families needing to walk up to our large, main gate that is set back from the road somewhat. It might mean just going carefully down the sides of cars. I will look at the verge and see if there is anything we can do with Highways about this being safer / better.
I will also be trying this in the mornings, so only opening the large gate at 8:40am as well as our gate to the car park. Perhaps more families can consider using our drop-off between 8:40 and 8:55am?
The ONLY time we will use the side gate in the morning is when we use it for specific morning transitions for pupils and with agreement with those families. If you get to us after 9am and the large gate is closed, please go to the gate with the intercom, where Mrs Carter will let your child in.
I hope you see this as a positive, safeguarding adaptation and I thank you for your cooperation, as always.
