As we approach a new academic year at Gower College Swansea, we are preparing to welcome back our returning students and greet new aspiring students alike.
In line with today's announcement from Welsh Government regarding changes to covid restrictions for educational settings, the College will now start to move towards a position where, whilst there is no requirement for most restrictions, they will still be encouraged.
At the current time, the numbers of positive covid cases are still relatively high, and therefore it will now be up to individuals to make their own judgement in terms of whether they will continue to follow the measures.
So what does this mean for the College?
We are continuing to work closely with the local Incident Management Team (IMT) and Public Health Wales to ensure we have the measures in place to keep our students learning and the College community safe. These currently include:
Hands - continue to wash and sanitise hands
Face - wear a face covering in communal areas (unless exempt)
Space - keep a physical distance from others
Following today's announcement from the First Minister, which outlines that cases in Wales are continuing to rise and restrictions in schools should remain in place up until Easter, we can confirm that the College will be continuing with its current covid safety measures.
These include:
The announcement by the Welsh Government last Friday was clear that any decision for further reductions in Covid restrictions was now for local discussion, using the Local Infection Control Decision Framework.
Therefore, this week we have met with our Regional Incident Management Team and education colleagues in our local colleges and can confirm that, from 28 February, face coverings will be removed in all classrooms and workshops.
Please note that face coverings will continue to be required in all communal areas after half term.
Following last Friday’s updated guidance from the First Minister in relation to education, there will be no changes to our current Covid measures within the College before half term.
This means the following safety measures are all still in place:
The Welsh Government's First Minister Mark Drakeford recently confirmed that from Friday 28 January, Wales will move to alert level zero, unless the public health situation changes for the worse.
But what does this mean for the College?
During the autumn term, we have had consistently low numbers of cases among our student community.
This has been a result of the safety measures we have in place and your cooperation in ensuring that we all work together to disrupt the transmission of the virus.
Currently there are many very different messages in the media about covid restrictions that can be very confusing – and so I thought that it may be useful to clarify the College’s position.
At this time, there are no proposals for any changes within the College or indeed within any education institution in Wales. Within Swansea, the risk of infection remains high and we all need to continue to remain vigilant.
It’s been a week already since we welcomed you all back to campus.
I therefore wanted to thank you for not only your patience and understanding, but your willingness to comply with the safety measures we have in place and your ongoing commitment to your studies.
As you know it has been a challenging few years, but we are committed to ensuring we can deliver as much face to face teaching as possible so that you have the best experience.
Tomorrow, Thursday 6 January we will be welcoming all of our students back to College.
Working closely within the guidance provided by both Welsh Government and our local public health team in Swansea, we will be continuing to prioritise face to face teaching as much as possible, whilst taking a positive approach to reducing any transmission of the virus.
Contact groups
For all students we will be returning to the contact group model that we used successfully in 2020.