St Ives School to close during G7 summit over 'significant safety concerns'
The Headteacher said he was concerned about the 'unpredictable nature of potential protests'
A school in Cornwall will close for three days during the G7 summit after a ‘number of significant safety concerns’ have been raised.
In a letter to parents, the headteacher of St Ives School, James Butterworth, said the decision was made following discussions with local police, members of the Truro and Petworth Academy Trust (TPAT) and having undertaken a risk assessment - factoring in possible safety risks for staff and students at the school while the event is taking place.
From their findings, the school found several significant safety concerns about keeping the site open during the Summit, including the scale and importance of the event, the ‘unpredictable nature of potential protests’ and a serious risk of disruption to transport routes – with the school being located so close to the Summit.
Therefore, students will be told to work from home on Thursday 10th, Friday 11th and Monday 14th June with the school implementing remote teaching and support systems to help minimise the disruption to students’ education.
"As preparations for the G7 Summit gather speed, the extent of the potential impact on the St Ives Community is becoming clearer.
"Following discussions with local police, the police logistic coordinators of the event and TPAT, a formal risk assessment has been undertaken by the school and a number of significant safety concerns have been raised.
These include:
- The scale and importance of the Summit.
- The unpredictable nature of potential protests and the scale at which these have happened in previous years.
- The increased security concerns that this creates for the school site being so close to key Summit locations within St Ives and the serious risk of disruption to transport on the routes to and from school, impacting directly on students and on other users including emergency vehicles.
- Given the very serious nature of these concerns, our risk assessment is that it is not possible for the school to manage these risks adequately for the duration of the Summit.
"St Ives School site will therefore be closed to all students and staff on Thursday 10th, Friday 11th and Monday 14th June. For these 3 days, we will use remote teaching and support systems to continue our students' education and to minimise the impact of this site closure.
"We are very aware that this is an additional 3 school days when our students have already experienced an extended period of time out of school in January and February.
"Please be assured that we are switching to remote provision after a detailed review of the potential impact of the Summit and because we do not feel we can adequately manage the safety risks associated with the Summit, given the location of our school site.
"We expect all our students to fully engage in our remote provision which will include live teaching in each lesson, in line with the students' timetables.
"We understand that for some families, supervision of children at home is very difficult. We will be asking these families to contact us and, if required, offering supervision at Hayle Academy as an alternative.
"We have only very limited capacity at Hayle Academy and can only offer this supervision to families most in need. Students eligible for free school meals will receive a voucher to the value of £7.50 to cover the 3 days that the school site will be closed."
Mr J Butterworth, Headteacher, St Ives School