This morning, the Deputy Minister of Education, Dr Reginah Mhaule, issued a directive that all schools, both independent and state, delay their reopening for the 2021 academic year until Monday 15 February 2021.
Accordingly, we hereby inform you that John Wesley School will not be opening on Monday 18 January 2021, as was previously scheduled. The exponential rise in COVID infections nationwide and the tragic COVID-related death of our Deputy Principal, Ms Sindi Zulu, serves to validate the wisdom of this decision, which was made with the safety of learners, staff, and their broader school communities top of mind.
Our teachers have been instructed to commence with preparations for the delivery of online lessons via ClassDojo. This said, please be aware that online teaching preparation is a very time-consuming and logistically challenging endeavour and we request that parents/guardians bear with us as we establish our new ClassDojo classrooms, incorporate new learners into our system and collate and distribute all of the support materials required by our learners.
This activity is scheduled to take place next week and we aim to be ready to go online by Monday 25 January 2021, at the latest. We will keep you updated with new information pertaining to this extended closure, as it becomes available.
We thank you in advance for your understanding and your patience.
Yours sincerely
Mr D. Tarr
Principal