29th May - Email to parents of children joining our school

Dear parents and guardians,
We are very much looking forward to welcoming your child to our school. We hope that you are all doing well during this strange time.
Under normal circumstances, we would have met you and your child by this stage for a welcome visit to our school. Unfortunately, that has not been possible due to restrictions in place. I am writing to let you know of our plan for helping your child to transition into our school as easily as possible.

1. We are inviting you to a parents-only Zoom meeting. This will provide you with the opportunity to learn a little more about Citywest ETNS and to get some tips for starting school in September. I will forward login details closer to the time. If you have not already used Zoom, please take time to practise between now and then.
   
2. I am currently uploading a virtual tour of our school building, adding one video per day. You may like to watch one or two videos per day with your child to help them get to know the building and get to know me.
   
3. We also have lots of activities outlined on our website, which you may find useful:
   
   1. Well-being Fortnight
      
   2. Language Fortnight
      
   3. Diversity Fortnight
      
   4. Life Skills
      
   5. Starting school - tips for families
      
   6. Preparing for the first day in Junior Infants
      
   7. Lots more - feel free to poke around and see what takes your interest!
      
4. Closer to the start date, we will introduce next year's Junior Infants teachers to you so that you can talk about them with your child
   
5. Our school expenses lists and calendar for next year were published this morning. Please come back soon to see the details of the list for Junior Infants. You will shortly receive a payment request email
   

We would also like to mention that some families are deciding not to start their child in Junior Infants as planned, but instead to do another year of pre-school. If your child would be eligible for another year of ECCE (i.e. was born on or after 1st January 2016), you might like to consider this option. With not finishing pre-school and with all the uncertainty about what school will look like in September, we would encourage you to take this option if you are at all doubtful. It would also mean they would be a year older when they start Junior Infants, which might make the transition a bit easier. Let us know if you decide that your child will not be starting in Junior Infants this September. While we cannot guarantee places for 2021, your child's older age next year would put them in a higher category than they were in this year, which increases the likelihood of them getting a place.
If your child will not be joining Citywest ETNS for any reason, please do let us know. As soon as the Department of Education release guidelines for reopening our school building, we will be busy planning for that and it is important that we know how many children we will have in each class so that we can optimise our resources.


We look forward to speaking with you soon, 
On behalf of the Citywest ETNS team,
Caitriona Hand,
​​​​​​​Principal.