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Gloucester Road Primary School – Embracing kindness in our school during Covid

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There are a great deal of schools and other agencies in Cheltenham now signed up to the NCLB campaign and this brings about a great sense of unity within our community. At Gloucester Road Primary School No Child Left Behind has always been part of our philosophy but during the COVID pandemic it feels even more important to hold the beliefs behind the campaign and enact them with even more urgency.

There has been a really strong sense of solidarity between the headteachers during this period. It has brought us closer together so that we can continue to offer great education and care of our children and families. The support between heads enables us to share ideas, especially when it comes to assisting our most vulnerable families. This is why this community agreement is so important.

At our school we have some unsung heroes who have gone above and beyond. For example our “Tracy” who has worked at GRPS for over 23 years, breakfast club, cleaner, MDS, caretaker – there isn’t much she doesn’t do. Over the lockdown period she collected food and delivered this from her Tesco trolley to lots of families, every day, helping them with much needed food extras. This level of kindness to help our community is simply wonderful.

We continue to have a termly swap shop of uniforms to help keep the cost down – our office staff run this.

The teachers, like many other schools, made weekly telephone calls to check in on families, offering support and signposting people to help within the community. Since September teachers have carefully and thoughtfully planned a restorative start to the curriculum to ensure the well-being of our children was a clear focus, especially for children who not been in school for months.

The launch day of NCLB was a great celebration of kindness across our school with each class starting their own ‘random acts of kindness’ projects.

As this campaign is about children they must get a mention! We have been humbled by their resilience throughout all of this – they came back in September and have adjusted to so many things with so much ease. Parents have been amazing in supporting the new routines at school, and they have quickly adapted to them. It has been heart-warming and uplifting for the team to have received many emails of thanks from parents. Again, acts of kindness that are truly felt.

We are very proud to be part of this campaign and we look forward to seeing it go from strength to strength.

Gayle Fletcher

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