School Closure Procedure

We will do everything that we can to keep St Mary’s open and thanks to our dedicated staff, it is rare for our school to be closed. However, we may need to close if we do not have enough staff to teach the pupils or if there are health and safety concerns that mean it would not be safe for the children to come in.

We will inform parents/carers of an emergency school closure using the following methods:

ESSEX COUNTY COUNCIL ONLINE NOTIFICATION

http://www.essex.gov.uk/Education-Schools/Schools/Dates/Pages/Emergency-School-Closures.aspx

Click on the link to go to the Essex County Council webpage that keeps parents/carers up-to-date about unplanned school closures. The website will be updated frequently, so you should keep checking it. If the school is not listed then it means that we are open. 

TEXT

We will send a text message to all of the numbers that we have saved on our text system. Please make sure that we have the correct contact details for you and please take responsibility for having your phones switched on and keep checking for texts if the weather is looking very bad. Text systems may suffer due to heavy use, so please always check the Essex County Council website.

SCHOOL WEBSITE

We will put an alert on the home page of the school website as soon as possible.

http://www.stmarysschoolburnham.org.uk/

The website may not cope with the pressure of heavy use, so please try the Essex CC website.

PLEASE DON’T PHONE TO CHECK IF WE ARE OPEN

Please avoid telephoning the school if the weather is bad. It is very difficult for the school to deal with hundreds of telephone calls from parents on a snowy morning, when members of staff, who are trying to get into school, urgently need to call in to inform us of their whereabouts. Also, the staff who are already in school will be trying to contact Essex, send texts and get messages onto the website for everyone to see as soon as possible.