Together again!!!
It was with great joy that young and older students of Elementary School, Kindergarten and Day Care Center returned to their school on Monday, 1 June after almost three months.
Laughter, voices and happy faces filled the school, a place so familiar and treasured that we have all been deprived of so much lately. Students saw their teachers up close again, following all the necessary precautions. After all, it is now a common belief amongst us that we must keep being careful and meticulous in following the rules of personal hygiene, now more than ever, since the danger of the coronavirus has not disappeared.
The Schools, complying with all the measures provided by the Ministry of Education and EODY and with safety and protection of all members of the educational community -students and teachers- as their main priority, have taken steps to ensure the safe transition of all of us to a new routine.
More specifically:
- The standard morning gathering takes place in the schoolyard, keeping the necessary safety distances.
- Before the students enter the building, they have their temperature measured with special thermal cameras.
- Hand sanitizers have been installed in all halls of the building.
- Breaks take place in different spots for each class so to avoid overcrowding, and extend in two different time zones, one for the three younger classes and one for the three older ones.
- The classrooms have been set up according to the instructions of the Ministry. Each student sits alone at the desk bearing a yellow and black marking, while desks are kept at a distance with yellow tape.
- During each break, classrooms are thoroughly cleaned and ventilated.
- In each classroom there is a computer and speakers so that students remaining at home can attend lessons online.
- In each classroom there is a hand sanitizer for use by students and teachers, a surface disinfectant and a roll of paper.
- In the toilets there are paper hand towels and liquid cream soap.
- Only one student enters each toilet at a time under the responsibility of teachers that are on duty. The rest of the students keep the required distances and wait in the hallway.
- According to the instructions of the Ministry, each class has been divided into two subclasses in each of which the number of students is no more than 14.
- Students that do not come to or leave school with their parents are transported in school buses.
- Each school bus provides a double seat for each student so that only half of the vehicle's occupancy is covered.
- All buses that transfer students are disinfected on a daily basis before and after each transfer, according to the instructions of the Ministry. This is followed by natural ventilation and a gap between uses.
The coronavirus adventure may have kept us away from our friends and loved ones but it has certainly made us stronger and more responsible! We need to prove how responsible we are during this time until the end of the school year.
We wish all our students a happy return to school!!