Pao School readies for return to campus

Date:April 24,2020

Author:包玉刚实验学校

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We have all been shocked and frightened by the impact of COVID-19 on China, especially on Wuhan and Hubei in the first instance, but now on the rest of the world. None of us are taking anything for granted and I know you will not either. Pao School has been working very closely with the SEC and Changing and Songjiang EDBs to ensure we not only comply with the tight regulations for reopening, imposed by the authorities, but do everything in our power to provide for your children’s safety when they return to campus.

——David Mansfield,

Executive Headmaster

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Epidemic prevention work that leaves no stone unturned

The school's wellness centers has played a vital role in its epidemic prevention efforts. Their responsibilities include communicating with the Purchasing Department on procurement needs and confirming material standards, overseeing the maintenance team's disinfection of campus, and staying up to date on the status of all students and recording all the relevant data. Some staff members and their families live on the Songjiang campus. Therefore, upon on returning to Shanghai, they must undergo home quarantine in their dorms. During the home quarantine process, the Songjiang campus nurses must maintain their daily health records.

With the date we return to campus approaching, each campus's wellness center is working diligently to mitigate health-related risks and prepare for the resumption of school on campus.

*Different colored rags for cleaning the different areas of the school. Like this, the rags stay in one area and are not easily mixed up and used elsewhere: White - for toilets; Blue - for outside/common areas; Green - for classrooms and offices.

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When we are finally able to return to campus, it is vital that parents, faculty, staff, and students do everything possible to ensure the campus remains a safe and virus free place.

——Siobhain Allum

Primary School Principal

and Head of Wuding Campus

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Ensuring the availability of essential epidemic prevention supplies

After learning of the COVID-19 outbreak, the purchasing team moved rapidly to ensure the school had the necessary anti-epidemic supplies. During the procurement process, the team encountered various difficulties. First, the needed equipment was in short supply and many suppliers required full payment up front, prior to shipment - a high risk for buyers. Secondly, the purchasing process of specialized medical supplies is different than ordinary purchases. To ensure the products meet national standards, all purchased materials need to be approved by the school doctor. Thus, the procurement process takes a long time, such that when the purchases are finally approved, products are already out of stock. To surmount this bottleneck, the purchasing team adopted a multi-pronged approach, making sure to both stay in touch with existing suppliers as well as find new suppliers online and offline.

After nearly two intense week, the purchasing team purchased a large amount of supplies such as disinfection products, protective equipment and temperature measurement equipment. After the preliminary purchasing work was completed, the team also tracked the shipments of the supplies, coordinating with the school's Operations Department for the receipt of the goods. Their efforts paid off: In early March, two batches of orders arrived safely.

At present, the purchasing team has prepared a full range of supplies that will be used when we return to campus. These include protective masks, disposable hand sanitizer, disinfection tablets, rubbing alcohol and other disinfection products, protective clothing (including for use in quarantine), safety goggles, ear thermometers, non-contact infrared forehead thermometers, and other types of thermometers.

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Gathering strength from solidarity

The generosity of Pao parents during this very challenging time has been inspirational, and helped to make us all safer and healthier. On the day before the start of the winter vacation, the Primary School parent Ms. Jin sent 1,000 KN95 masks to the Primary School. At the same time, Mr. Ni, the Chairperson of the High School PTA ,came to the school with masks he purchased himself and distributed them to students who would soon be heading home for winter vacation.

When the COVID-19 outbreak first began, key protective supplies were hard to find. Under these daunting conditions, many parents stepped forward, raising funds to purchase the needed supplies and donating them to the school.

In the Primary School, the following parents made donations or helped facilitate them: Mr. Han donated 600 N95 masks; Mr. Zhang donated 6,000 disposable surgical masks; Ms. Sun donated 1,000 disposable surgical masks; Ms. Zhang helped arrange a donation of 100 thermometers from Zhejiang manufacturers; Mr. Wu donated 200 bottles of disposable hand sanitizing gel. Further, Ms. Chen, a Middle School parent, donated RMB 50,000 to purchase masks and disinfection supplies.

Other key donations came from High School parents, including some who have chosen to remain anonymous. Meanwhile, a parent donated 5,000 N95 masks and the mother of a Year 10 student donated 8,000 medical masks. Additionally, some members of the wider Pao community also made important donations respectively.

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Looking back over the past few weeks, we faced many significant challenges. However, our teachers and students have shown their resilience. We are pleased to see everyone's growth and achievements that have occurred in spite of the challenging circumstances.

——Caroline Xu,

Deputy Head (Academics)

Middle School Principal

and Head of Hongqiao Campus

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How are we preparing to return to campus?

At present, each campus has made full preparations for the start of school, and has also distributed the "Re-opening of YK Pao School" guide to everyone in the community. The following is part of the "Re-opening of YK Pao High School Campus" issued by the High School:

Quarantine restrictions

1) Teachers, housemasters, tutors and support staff will look out for students with flu- like symptoms and fever. Any student who has flu-like symptoms will be immediately reported to the Wellness Center.

2) The Wellness Center will immediately quarantine the student and trace disease contacts. Parents will immediately be notified to take the student home for observation or to visit a hospital.

3) Absence due to illness: The Wellness Center will follow up all cases of absence due to illness. The nurse will record and report the cases per government requirements.

Social distancing

There are a number of measures that we are taking to keep students "socially distanced" from each other.

1) We will ensure that the seating in the cafeteria is spread out so students will have more distance between them than they are used to.

2) Desks in classrooms have been moved apart so there will be more space between students.

3) Students will be required to keep an appropriate distance from each other in the library.

Preparing for return to campus

Catering

1) We will be working with the food supplier to ensure vigorous and comprehensive food safety management processes are in place and that all cafeteria staff adhere strictly to all health checks.

2) The thermal imaging camera and hand sanitizers will be set up outside the cafeteria and no-one will enter the cafeteria without passing through this.

3) All catering staff will ensure hand sanitizers are used and masks are worn at all times.

4) Tables and chairs will be re-configured before students return to ensure sufficient space is established between each student and teacher.

5) The queueing system will be revised to ensure that appropriate space is maintained between each student.

6) Meal times will be staggered to ensure that there is not a large number of people in the cafeteria at any one time.

Emotional and mental well-being

Although the main focus must, of course, be on protecting our students from the virus, we are also very aware that for some students these last few months will have been challenging for them both emotionally and mentally. Therefore, our pastoral staff including Housemasters/Housemistresses, tutors and the social and emotional counselling team will be working together to do all that we can to provide the necessary support for our students.

Visitor restrictions

Only essential visitors (those involved in school operations) may enter campus. Before entering campus, all visitors must have their body temperature measured and put on a mask. Parents who send their children back to school on April 26 or April 27 should not enter campus.

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It is vital that parents, teachers and students do everything we can to ensure that the campus remains safe and virus free. Whilst, we will enact a whole host of measures on campus to help reduce any chance of infection, the most important thing is to prevent anyone with the virus entering the campus.

——Mark Bishop,

High School Principal

and Head of Songjiang Campus