Being Prepared for COVID

At Geraldton Senior High School, we like to assure parents that the school is a safe environment for all students. As a school we are following the guidelines provided by the Department of Education, Healthy WA and State Government. It’s important that parents feel that the school is undertaking COVID safe measures, such as;

• Ventilation of classrooms – Assessments of each classrooms has been undertaken and some classrooms have been provided with air purifiers to ensure good air flow. Doors and windows are open during the day.

• Cleaning and good hygiene – Hand sanitiser is available through out the school and in every classroom. Additional cleaning of surfaces around the school has been increased. Signage has been placed around the school to remind students to wash hands and use sanitiser while entering the classrooms.

• Safe WA App – Parents and visitors are encouraged to sign in via the Safe WA app when entering the school.

• Vaccinations – All staff working in the school are double vaccinated and staff are receiving their booster vaccination as it becomes due. Students are not required to be vaccinated unless they are going on a work placement, apprenticeship or traineeship.

• Use of face masks – Students are required to wear a mask when indoors at school.  Wearing a face mask helps to reduce the spread of COVID in the community.

• First Aid Officer – The school nurse is available to assist students when feeling unwell.

For more about being prepared for COVID – please view the Principal’s Message here

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Close Contact Deemed by the Health Department (10/3/2022)

Close contact

In a very high caseload environment, a close contact includes:

• A household close contact: a household member or intimate partner of a person with COVID-19 who has had contact with them during their infectious period.
• Someone who has had close contact with a person in their infectious period, including:
  • At least 15 minutes face-to-face contact where a mask was not worn by both the person with COVID-19 and the exposed person.
  • Greater than 2 hours within a small room or classroom environment, where masks have been removed for this period by both the person with COVID-19 and the exposed person (note: others wearing masks in this scenario would not be a contact).

*NOTE: the contact can occur either inside or outside school.

• Someone who is directed by WA Health that they are a close contact

Asymptomatic Close Contact

Students in school who are asymptomatic but have been identified as a close contact will be able to do the following, provided they remain asymptomatic:
• Attend school, before and after school care
• Travel between the student’s usual place to residence and their school
• Attend school-based sporting, cultural training or after school events at students’ school
Student must self-isolate at all other times until the 7 days has passed.

NOTE: These settings do not apply to students who are household close contact – in this case, students will need to self-isolate for seven days and follow the regular close contact protocols.

Click here to view Asymptomatic Close Contact Protocols (10 March 2022)

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Sick or Unwell Students

If a student is feeling unwell, or has cold or flu-like symptoms they should stay home and inform the school of their absence by

• sending an SMS to 0407 081 344
• emailing geraldton.shs.studentservices@education.wa.edu.au
• phoning the School Attendance Officer directly on 08 9965 8415
• providing a written explanation to the student’s Form Teacher.

If a student shows COVID symptoms such fever (≥37.50C) OR recent history of fever (e.g. night sweats, chills), without a known source OR Acute respiratory symptoms (including cough, shortness of breath, sore throat, runny nose) OR Acute loss of smell or taste, then testing is required. A use of rapid antigen testing (RAT) will show a positive or negative result for COVID.

(Source: www.healthywa.wa.gov.au)

If a student has a confirmed positive case

• Notify the school about the positive case (Click here – Positive Test)
• Self-isolate for a minimum of seven days
• At Day 7, if symptoms are still present, continue isolating until symptoms clear
• If no symptoms are present after Day 7, you can leave self-isolation. No testing is required.
• Report your positive RAT to WA Health at www.healthywa.wa.gov.au/ratregister
• See a Doctor via a Telehealth appointment to get a Doctors Certificate at Student Services for absence.

If you are a symptomatic/sick and had a close contact, you must:

• Notify the school about the positive case
• Self-isolate for seven days from the date of contact with positive case
• Take a PCR or RAT on Day 1 or as soon as possible
  • If positive – follow positive case guidelines (as above)
  • If negative – stay in isolation, take a RAT in 24 hours and remain in isolation
    • If positive – follow positive case guidelines (as above)
  • If negative – and no new household members have tested positive – take a RAT again on Day 7, before ending isolation.
• Report your positive RAT to WA Health at www.healthywa.wa.gov.au/ratregister
• Provide Doctors Certificate at Student Services for absence

For more information visit www.healthywa.wa.gov.au

*Always follow the health advice

If a student is asymptomatic close contact of a COVID-19 case outside the home.

(Students that are asymptomatic household close contacts must stay in quarantine.)

Continue attending school, if no symptoms.

Students who are a close contact of a COVID-19 case outside the home, can continue to attend school under a modified quarantine arrangement.

Take a PCR test or a RAT within 24 hours of becoming a close contact:

• if positive – follow confirmed COVID-19 case guideline.
• if negative – under modified quarantine arrangements students can attend:
• school;
• out of school care; and
• sporting or cultural training, practice or events organised through the relevant school and held immediately before or after school on the student’s school grounds, travelling between the student’s usual place of residence and the place where the activity above takes place. 

Note: at all other times students are required to isolate.

Take a PCR test on Day 6 or a RAT on Day 7:

• if positive – follow confirmed positive case guideline. All positive RATs must be reported to WA Health via www.healthywa.wa.gov.au/ratregister. 
• if negative – no further action required.

You must return a negative Day 6 PCR test or Day 7 RAT and continue modified quarantine arrangement until the end of Day 7. After this point, provided you have no symptoms and no one in your household has tested positive, you can leave isolation. When students return to school, principals are not required to confirm any evidence of testing and/or a negative test result.

Note: If symptoms develop at any time during your modified quarantine arrangements, take a RAT or PCR test as soon as possible. 

• if PCR test is negative – continue to isolate.
• if RAT is negative – continue to isolate and take a repeat RAT 24 hours after your first RAT.

If your PCR or first RAT after developing symptoms was on Day 7 of your isolation, you must continue to isolate until you are informed that the PCR is negative or until your second RAT is negative.

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For students in isolation due illness or COVID

It is important for students to try and continue their studies while in isolation.

Geraldton Senior High Schooluses Connect to communicate with parents and students, and it provides all the course work, assignments and due dates while in isolation.

If you haven’t logged into Connect, please click here to view the log in details.

Be prepared and ensure that you can access Connect at home.

Revised Quarantine Requirements (8/3/2022) – Healthy WA Click here for more information for Parents

Effective immediately, household members are no longer required to quarantine with a child who is identified as a close contact of a COVID-19 case. A parent or carer may still need to stay home to care for a child quarantining, but the rest of the household, including siblings who have not been identified as close contacts, are not required to stay home.

As a household member of a close contact, it is important to take extra precautions, where possible, including:

• minimise physical contact with the close contact
• sleep separately from the close contact
• use a separate bathroom from the close contact if possible
• wash hands with soap and water for at least 20 seconds or use an alcohol-based hand sanitiser
• cover coughs and sneezes
• Regularly clean all surfaces (such as tabletops, doorknobs and bathroom fixtures) by using household disinfectant or diluted bleach solution
• wear a mask in shared areas or when caring for other members of the household.

It is important that members of the household monitor for COVID-19 symptoms, and if symptoms develop, get tested immediately. If a person living in the house tests positive to COVID-19, all household members are close contacts and must self-isolate.