Plan Ahead for Safety and Security

The safety and security of students is our priority at Collingwood School. We need the support of parents to ensure that students understand, prior to coming to school, how they will be going home and with whom. This is helpful for your child so they do not need to wonder/worry about this during their school day. Predictability helps children feel secure. Without this in place, the volume of calls received during the school day about such matters quickly becomes unmanageable and at the end of the day it is not always possible to locate a child regarding a last-minute change. For these reasons, we ask you to follow these guidelines:

• Except in the case of an unexpected emergency, do not call or e-mail the office to change end-of-day plans.
• If you decide to pick up your child/ren who normally take the bus, write a note for them and be waiting for them at their bus prior to 2:35 PM (12:10 PM on Fridays). If you are not there on time and your child does not have a note in their agenda, they will be sent home on their regular bus. The school is unable to orchestrate play dates, extra-curricular activities or group work involving busing changes.
• If you always pick up your child, please be sure to meet them at their designated door. Do not use the Creative Playground or field as your meeting spot. This way, should you be late, your child will wait for you at the front entry way.
• Phone calls to students – Calls to students will not be put through to classrooms. If you must speak to your child before the end of the school day, we will take a message and have your child call you back when it is not disruptive to the classroom learning time.
• Phone calls from students –  Students are not allowed to use phones in the school without supervision / permission. If you have made arrangements with your child to have them call you during one of their breaks, please provide a note for your child to give to the office so we can facilitate the process. Any other necessary calls to home regarding sickness, injury, or other matters will be made by a teacher or office staff.

Sign-in Procedures

• Upon each entry to the building, all parents / visitors / guests are required to sign in at the school office. For student safety, no adults are permitted to proceed to classrooms without first signing in at the office, except during parent-teacher conferences. This protocol is in effect on all school days, before, during and after regular school hours.
• If you are formally scheduled to volunteer, please sign in at the office and wear your badge while you are in the school.
• All students who are late for any reason are required to check in at the office and pick up a late slip.
• Once students are checked in to the office and have their late slip, we ask that they walk by themselves to their classroom.
• All students who are leaving early must be signed out by a parent or other person who is on the contact list in the office. The meeting place for early pick-up is always the school office.
• Parents/ Guardians are asked to promptly report any changes in personal information such as phone numbers or emergency contacts to the office as soon as possible. The school needs to be able to reach someone on your contact list at all times that your child(ren) is in our care.

Supervision

Supervision is provided 15 minutes before school begins at 7:45 AM, at recess, and during the lunch hour. There is no supervision provided after school hours. Please ensure that your child does not arrive at the school before supervision starts. Please do not drop your child off at the main office before the supervision time. We do not have personnel to supervise child(ren) arriving too early. Dropping young children off and leaving them unsupervised places them at risk. Please make alternate arrangements for your children. 

Noon Hour

We will continue with our split session eating/playing noon hour with our Grade 1 – 5 students. Once again, our Grade 1 and 2 students will eat lunch in their designated areas from 11:20 – 11:45 AM and then go out to play, either on the creative playground or on the fields. The Grade 3, 4 and 5 students will go outside and play from 11:20 -11:45 and then come in to their designated areas from 11:45 – 12:09 PM to eat lunch. We have found this organization to be the most effective in balancing supervision numbers throughout the school.

Fire Drills

These drills are done to ensure that everyone in building knows what to do in case of an emergency. When the fire bell rings, all classes move quietly out the nearest exit to assemble on the field. Students are informed in advance of the first drill so that they know what to expect. Subsequent drills will be unannounced.