We are very excited to be one of just 200 schools across Ireland taking part in Summer Provision 2020. We have taken part in July Provision every year since our Class for Children with Autism opened and we were delighted to hear the Minister's announcement that we could welcome more children this year.

Citywest ETNS looks forward to welcoming 31 children to Summer Provision this year. The children will work across 6 classes with a total of 21 staff members. Other than the 6 children in the Early Intervention Class for Children with Autism, who will be focusing on getting used to school, the 25 children in other classes will work on getting the school ready for everyone else to return, as well as trying out games, yards and mobility plans for everyone. These children will be our Safety Champions when everyone else returns at the end of August.

We hope they will enjoy the summer camp. We know for sure that they will take their roles as Safety Champions seriously and we look forward to working as a team to set up our school for reopening! What a great community we have!

I'm sure it's not news to anyone that, while the Department of Education have been promising guidelines for over a month now, they are yet to issue anything to or for schools on how we are to reopen. It has been very frustrating and we are regretful that we don't have any certainties to offer to parents as we finish up this school year as to what school will look like in the new school year.

We are, however, primed and ready to go again in mid August, in the hopes that guidelines will have reached us by that stage.

We have various reopening committees who have been planning as far as we can plan:

• Reopening learning and teaching
• Reopening logistics
• Reopening Junior Infants
• Covid-19 Committee
• Reopening Relationships
• Summer Provision team

Each committee has tentative plans based on the different scenarios we anticipate may be happening.

We have plans for a full reopening, partial reopening and distance reopening. We have plans for lunches, yards, arrival and dismissal. We have plans for support teaching, co-teaching, resources and movement breaks. 

We are as set up as we can be at this stage.

Whatever scenario greets us at the end of August, we have identified a number of areas where we expect children to struggle. We will be focusing on those areas in September and we encourage you to do what you can to set your child up for success too.

We expect to have a plan to share with you some time between 14th and 21st August. If you have any feedback that will help us in planning for next year, particularly in relation to how distance learning went, please let us know below. We will not be able to reply to each one but we will take it into account when planning in mid August.

​Many thanks.

This bunch of really cool people have made history from their first day of school right to their last!

On their first day of Junior Infants, they OPENED A SCHOOL! Their first day of Junior Infants was also the first day of Citywest ETNS!

And they finished with a bang too - with a unique virtual graduation!

We are so so proud of them and we wish them the very very best as they move on to the next stage of their lives.

PS We were very impressed at how reluctant every single child was to step off the path and onto the bedding area. They all went to walk around the path and had to be persuaded that it was ok THIS ONCE to walk on the mulch. These children are the best!

PPS You won't be able to see the photos on the mobile version of the website. Please go to Web version to see the photos. Thanks.

As we all adjusted to working and learning from home over the past few months, we decided to trial Zoom calls with our pupils. The aim of these calls was to provide greater connection between home and school. The schedule for the school Zoom account quickly filled up with assemblies, weekly ANA calls and individual class calls. 

This week is the last week of the school year, meaning we are currently participating in the final Zoom calls for each class. This gives pupils the opportunity to see their friends and classmates once more before the summer holidays. Caitríona also hosted a final assembly on Zoom last Friday - another lovely way to mark the end of the academic year!

End-of-year reports are issued two weeks before the end of the school year. This year, that is 12th June. This is so that parents have an opportunity to address any questions to the child's teacher before the end of the school year.

Based on work up to 12th March only
While teachers may make a comment on the content the child has sent in since the school building closed, any assessment or judgement is based on the child's presentation and work in class up to 12th March.

No standardised test results available
As standardised tests did not take place this year, there are no standardised test results on the report cards. If your child is moving school, we advise giving the new school a copy of their 2019 report as well as their 2020 report sot that the new school can see their most recent standardised test results. This applies for those moving to secondary school as well as those moving to a different primary school.

Meaning of grades
Where a mark is given (all classes other than Junior Infants and Claire's class), that will be between 1 and 5.

3 is what is expected for each child. A mark of 3 means that your child is right on track, following the curriculum and doing fine. We expect that 60% of pupils - or approx 16 children in each class - would be given a mark of 3. 

20% will achieve below that and we expect approx 4 children per class (15%) to be given a mark of 2 in any area and 1 child per class (5%) to be given a mark of 1.

Similarly, 20% will achieve above that with approx 4 children in a class to be given a mark of 4 and 1 child per class given a mark of 5.

This is the general bell curve for the population. Of course, every class doesn't follow that curve exactly. However, we hope that outlining it helps you to understand the marks given for your child a little better.

Attendance
It is our obligation to report to TESS where a child has missed 20 days or more in a given school year. This is regardless of the reason for the absences and regardless of whether the families informed us of a reason for the absences. We have no choice in making this report.

If we are concerned about your child's attendance, we will have been in touch with you. To seek action and support from an Educational Welfare Officer in supporting your child's attendance, we need to complete a referral form. You will be informed about this at the time of referral.

Having your child's name submitted for missing 20 days or more in the school year is NOT a referral. It is simply a report.

Aladdin Connect
This year, end-of-year reports are going to you via the Aladdin Connect app. They should appear there before midday on 12th June.

For families who have not sent us consent for Aladdin Connect, we will print and post the report cards. This will happen on Tuesday 16th June.

Usually at this time of year, we would have met with the pupils and families who are due to join our school in September. We invite them to visit our school, meet our staff and speak with Caitríona. This year, however, we have had to come up with a new plan!

While we cannot meet families in the usual way, we are using Zoom to host our Information Night, tomorrow, 11th June. We have 3 meetings scheduled for: 
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1. Parents of incoming pupils to our Early Intervention ASD class.
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Please click here to view a presentation for parents of incoming pupils to our Early Intervention ASD Class.

2. Parents of incoming Junior Infants.

Please click here to view a presentation for parents of incoming pupils to our Junior Infant Classes.
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3. Parents of pupils joining classes from Senior Infants - 6th. 

​Please click here to view a presentation for parents of incoming pupils to our higher classes.

We cannot wait to to meet the parents and guardians of our new pupils... and we cannot wait to meet the children in September!

This week, we featured in an article for The Irish Times, all about how schools are planning for and organising 6th class graduations. Caitríona spoke about the plans we have made for our current 6th class pupils and the alternative arrangements which are being put in place for this year's ceremony. Have a read of the article here - well done to Caitríona and all involved!

Each day over the coming weeks, our principal Caitriona will upload a video from a different place in our school building, creating a virtual tour through our building. We hope these videos help our pupils to stay connected to our school and also help those getting ready to join our community to get ready for that in the absence of the visits we would usually have around this time. 

This year has been such a whirlwind, its hard to keep up. Some images today reminded us that we are still in the middle of moving building. We were only in two months before we had to close up the building and there is so much left to do! Exciting times ahead of us, still!