Date: 23 Feb 2022
Kia ora Berkley Community
We would like to thank everyone who is endeavouring to meet the demands of the current Covid situation. We are grateful to parents who have responded to information relating to positive cases, close contacts and the need for testing. (We know the queues at testing stations have been particularly challenging.). We are also thankful to those parents who have responded to the notification regarding isolation demands.
Please continue to make contact with [email protected] if you have any questions or wish to notify us.
We were informed last night that the Ministry of Health has made changes to the classification of close contacts in schools:
• Students who have been in a room with a masked positive case will now be classified as Casual Contacts
• The new classification will be applied retrospectively to contacts identified from 18 February onwards.
• For schools with current cases, any contacts that were previously identified as Close under that specific criterion may now be re-classified as Casual Contacts.
• Casual Contacts are able to attend school unless they become symptomatic.
Any student who has previously been notified as a close contact at Berkley and been asked to isolate, may now return to school if they are NOT displaying symptoms of Covid.
This change will significantly reduce the necessity for whole classes to go into isolation. In turn this means students can maintain regular attendance at school with less interruption to their learning time. (There may still be times when the Ministry decides that it is necessary for large groups of students to isolate, and you will be notified if this occurs.)
If in future your child is identified as a close contact you will be expected to:
• SELF-ISOLATE FOR 7 DAYS from the date they had contact with the case
• Get them tested on DAY 5
• Your child can stop isolating and RETURN to normal life once you have received a negative day 5 test AND once 7 days have passed (i.e, on day 8)
• Please share a screenshot of the negative day 5 test with us. [email protected]
If your child tests positive:
• The isolation period for COVID-19 cases in the community is 10 days. If you are still sick after the 10 days, stay home.
• Start counting the 10 days from day zero (0). Day 0 is the day that your symptoms started or that you got tested (if you do not have any symptoms).
• You may return to school if you are symptom free once the 10 days have passed.
Mask-wearing, hand-washing, and staying home if you are unwell continue to be strong protections against Covid.
Thank you for your continued support, and flexibility as we adapt to the requirements.
Nathan Leith
Principal
NB: Please check your email folders to ensure that [email protected] has not gone to your junk/email folder.
