Our College is committed to safety and ensuring our learning environment protects you as well as offers outstanding teaching and learning. We have completed and continue to review (in line with new updated guidance) our Covid Risk assessment. You can access the full risk assessment here.

In addition to guidance we have adopted a number of approaches to minimise risk and keep students and staff safe.

• Creation of “bubbles” to minimise risk and exposure. Bubbles have been set up with different entrances, toilets, learning areas and lunch times. Please help us by sticking to your bubble.
• We are asking staff and students to wear a mask or face covering in all “common areas”
• Extra cleaning and deep cleaning schedules are now in operation to keep our buildings safe
• Practice the Catch it, Bin it, Kill it! Approach to good respiratory hygiene
• Extra hand sanitisers are located throughout the building. We would still encourage all college members to wash their hands more frequently
• Encourage students and staff who aren’t feeling well to follow NHS advice and not come into college. Please follow government guidelines
• Signs and information throughout the building to support you if you should begin to feel unwell whilst at college
• Try and cycle to walk to college if you can. If you are using transport please wear a mask or face covering
• Not come on campus if you don’t have any scheduled classes to help us control numbers
• No visitors to the college until it is safer to do so. We will update this as the term progresses

The government guidance that applies to Further Education colleges can be found here:

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/coronavirus-covid-19-maintaining-further-education-provision/what-fe-colleges-and-providers-will-need-to-do-from-the-start-of-the-2020-autumn-term

Please note that this guidance differs from the government guidance for schools.

The College is continuously updating its risk assessment and plans in light of new guidance, the situation in the local area and Public Health England findings.

The current arrangements will be reviewed in October and changes may come into effect after that point. If guidance should change dramatically before that then we may amend things accordingly.

We will do our utmost to not alter the timetable that you have been given, although we do apologise in advance if small changes have to be made to keep everyone safe.

The government are very keen for all students to return to learning. We feel confident that our mitigations and systems should make you feel more comfortable about coming into college. However, we have a number of teams dedicated to student support who would be more than happy to support you in this process.

Please get in touch with the Programme office if there is anything you would like us to be aware of or you feel you need a bit or support.

In College = Wear a Mask

To keep you and others safe, please be advised that from Thursday September 17th you will be expected to wear a face covering or visor in all your lessons and in all common areas AND on all transport.

Please be aware that the College can no longer provide free masks/visors and so a £1 charge will be implemented from Monday 21st September.

Face coverings should cover both your mouth and nose.  This is in line with government guidance about face coverings for staff and children in Year 7 or above in England.

You must take care when putting on or removing your face covering. Clear guidance is available on how to wear a face covering. We recommend washable, fabric face coverings, rather than disposable ones, for environmental reasons. You are likely to need at least 3 clean face coverings during a college day, including your bus journeys, so please have these with you in small plastic bags, and then wash them each evening.

We would prefer plain coloured face coverings without logos or graphics which could cause upset.

Some people are exempt from the wearing of face coverings, and if this applies to you we ask you to wear a badge on your lanyard to indicate this, so that you are not requested to put one on

Please keep looking at our websites for new information. Anything that impacts upon you directly will be communicated through MS Teams, text or on email.

In the event of another lockdown, the whole college will continue all learning programmes online. We will stick to the as closely as possible to the existing timetable you would have been accessing at college. We are committed to supporting all our learners to succeed and are fully prepared if this eventuality should happen.

If a lockdown should happen, we will communicate via our website, via student emails, via MS Teams, as well as our social media channels.

At the moment, our key control measures are to:

• a) Reduce close contact by maintaining distinct groups (“bubbles”), with all students in the bubble able to attend sessions together.
• b) Reduce close contact via social distancing, with limited numbers in each classroom and a blend of on-campus and online learning.

Students enrolled on vocational courses will form “bubbles” within their curriculum area. Vocational students may access appropriate parts of their timetable online. Social distancing measures are in place across the campus, to ensure that these students have close contact only with those in their “bubble”.

Students enrolled to A Level courses attend lessons with several groups of students each day. These students can therefore not form “bubbles”, because their “bubble” would very quickly reach in excess of 800 students. Therefore, these students attend small group lessons on campus with social distancing measures in place, and access other parts of their timetable online.

Other schools and colleges are following the same government guidance, but their individual building layouts, student numbers and types of courses, may mean that timetables are quite different.

For students on blended learning courses; your learning will be delivered as a mix of face-to-face on-campus learning and remote and online learning. This will include live sessions, as well as recorded material and additional resources provided on your digital learning platform.

Whole class teaching sessions will be online in a mix of live and recorded formats. This will allow you to access your learning in a flexible way that suits you, through our VLE (SOLAR).

Smaller group and 1-to-1 sessions will be held both face-to-face on campus and online, and are designed to support discussion and collaborative learning, whatever the format. We will provide at least one face-to-face session with each of your teachers, every week.

Practical learning such as laboratory based, performance, technical skills, and studio based will take place on campus where needed, and we have put specific control measures in place to ensure that these sessions are delivered safely.

Your teachers, progress mentor and other staff are available to support you as always, both in person and online.

Your subject teachers will explain what the exact blend will be like in each specific subject area, and what you can expect each day of the week.

In addition to your usual college and personal equipment, please bring a supply of washable face coverings, and a small bottle of hand sanitiser. You will always need your college ID card and lanyard while at college.

Don’t worry all support functions have been set to ensure that they support you and your learning in any way they can.

Yes, our refectories will be open with an increased number of till points. We would encourage card payments but will be able to take cash if required. We have set up a number of marquees around the College to allow you to eat safely in your bubble area. You will be able to bring your own food into College should you wish.

Click here for information on 'bubbles'.